Not the Plan
by JaneAlpha
Summary: Q gets kidnapped. His kidnappers weren't so considerate as to let him take his suppressants so he goes into heat. To make matters worse his complete f**kwit of a boss sends a f**king Alpha to rescue him. NB: Swearing won't be *'d out. Q will be very angry at every f**king Alpha. Bond is one of those f**king Alphas. M is another f**king Alpha. Beta'd By Dawn Phoenix (00Q)
1. Chapter 1

He couldn't really blame 007 for the situation however much he wanted to. He should also stop thinking about the 'if onlys' too. If only he had taken his suppressant before he had left for work; that would have bought him another day. If only he hadn't been kidnapped on the Tube; then Bond wouldn't have had to rescue him. If only it had been another spy to rescue him; a beta perhaps? If only Bond had already had an Omega; current crisis would have been averted.

Moneypenny told him it was fate when they had finally reported back to headquarters five and a half days after he had been kidnapped. "Fate!" he had snapped back at her. "Of course. Makes perfect sense now; it's fate. Fate that two people with nothing in common apart from working for MI6 and drinking the same beer should be mated. Let's not mention the twenty year age gap."

"Fifteen," Bond had helpfully corrected from the doorway to M's office. "M would like to speak to you."

"Oh good. I have a few things to ask our esteemed leader too. Such as, why he would send an Alpha to rescue an Omega who is most likely without their suppressants?" He had stormed into M's office sending a parting glare at Moneypenny as he went.

"007 simply volunteered and was on his way to your location before your intern found your suppressants in your drawer, Q." M and double-oh had shared a look then that clearly said 'silly little Omegas - aren't they funny'.

"I know you're thinking that my mind is all jumbled from the pheromones, the shock of being kidnapped, and then mated in quick succession. Well, I'm perfectly fine. Just very pissed off and I think I have a very good reason to be so."

"I sympathise, Q, I really do. Perhaps you should take a couple of weeks leave. Sort a few things out. You'll need to find somewhere to live, I assume."

"My flat's fine." He wasn't moving for anyone. If they were going to live together it was going to be at his flat. M accepted that Q's flat was indeed 'fine' when Bond didn't argue. Fucking Alphas.

"Alright, well, take two weeks anyway to move 007's belongings in and get used to your new relationship. Bond, report for duty tomorrow at 0800 hours. I have a new assignment for you." Q knew a dismissal when he heard one but he was one pissed=off Omega and he wasn't just going to let these Alphas make all his decisions.

"Two weeks, M? And Bond gets to just return tomorrow?"

"Q, you're being emotional, irrational, and just downright irritating. You're not the Quartermaster I need right now. Take him home double-oh but make sure medical check him over before you leave." Bond had pulled him from the room then, hand securely over his mouth to stop any other arguments. Fucking Alphas. To top his day off, medical had officially deemed him 'unfit' for duty. Thank god that his contraceptives took at least a month to leave his system, ensuring that he wouldn't be having any baby Bonds this time round. His suppressants had been confiscated though. Apparently it wasn't healthy for a mated pair to not experience heat together. The contraceptives were staying; medical hadn't argued with him on that front.

Once back at the flat Bond had told him that he would go and collect his belongings and had left him to his sulking. So here he now lay, contemplating the entire sorry situation. Mated. He was mated to James bloody Bond, spy extraordinaire, master seducer, and all round great Alpha. Fucking Alphas. Now he had to live with this guy and be a submissive little Omega to him. The thought of cooking for Bond or pressing the man's expensive suits knocked him a little sick. This was not in the plan; the plan was to remain un-mated until he was at least 40 and was past child-rearing age. He planned to be mated to a like-minded computer geek who had no intention of starting a family and was happy to simply sit about the flat de-coding each other's codes. If Bond asked him for a child, he couldn't very well say no, could he?

Q heard the front door open and shut, signalling Bond's return. He should probably go and help the man unpack, he thought while hoisting himself up with a big sigh. 007 wasn't in the living area but Q could hear him shuffling about in the spare room. His spare room was bare; the full-length window which looked out over the city was the room's main focus. The walls were white along with the bed sheets, the only things that varied were the black dresser and wardrobe. The room was clinical; the room was Bond. On the bed was a small suitcase and Bond was putting a couple of suits away which still had plastic over them from the dry cleaners.

"Is this all you have?"

Bond opened up his suitcase, which seemed to contain a spare pair of shoes, shaving supplies, hair products, and his MI6-issued laptop. "MI6 sold all my belongings when I was 'killed in action'. I haven't got round to buying anything I don't need yet."

Q moved more into the room when Bond entered the en suite to put away his toiletries. "You do realise that this is the spare room, don't you? My bedroom's the other one."

Bond sent him a withering look as he came back from the bathroom.

"I thought you'd be more comfortable with me in here." The suitcase was put away in the wardrobe and the room looked no more lived-in than it had before Bond had started unpacking.

"That's very considerate of you, Bond." Q bent his head as a sign of submission which he felt was an appropriate 'thank you' for an Alpha. 007 growled in response and gently pushed Q from the room.

"This is why I never wanted to be mated; I didn't want to have to deal with a simpering, over-emotional, needy Omega." Bond sat him down and placed a pizza box on his lap. "I hope you like pepperoni."

Q was in shock, and completely offended, but he knew his behaviour since he'd come out of heat had been... Well, let's just say it wasn't the sort of behaviour an Alpha desired in an Omega. He decided it was probably in his best interest to just eat what Bond had provided and not take offence to what the Alpha had said. Swallow your pride and all that.

"I'm sorry," Bond bit out while he was clearing away their take-away boxes. "I shouldn't have called you those things. I realise this must be difficult for you."

"No. I'm the one who should be apologising. I've been difficult; not for one moment have I considered your feelings on the matter. I'm sorry." Q headed to his room. It was a huge relief knowing that Bond didn't want to be mated either. That way they could both continue with their lives with only the bi-yearly interruptions of his heat. Maybe things wouldn't be quite as bad as he thought. Fucking Alphas.


	2. Chapter 2

Halfway down the street, Q realised he'd forgot his gloves. Damn. It was cold. Making the decision to go back for them was going to ruin his day. Not to mention his life. He'd missed his usually Tube and had had to get the one two minutes later. Two minutes was nothing to the early bird, but Q disliked deviating from his schedule. As he left Vauxhall Tube station at precisely 0823, he was taken quite by surprise when he was man-handled into a dark Range Rover. National State of Emergency that couldn't wait the extra 2.4 minutes it took him to cross the road, perhaps? No, life just wasn't that simple. He was gagged and blindfolded and it was then that Q realised he'd just been kidnapped within spitting distance of MI6 headquarters.

It took Q precisely 30 seconds to come to the conclusion that he had been kidnapped by complete idiots. It wasn't going to take his colleagues long to track them. By 0900 one of his underlings would surely have raised the alarm that MI6's Quartermaster hadn't turned up for work. Moneypenny would quickly confirm that he hadn't 'rung in sick' or made any sort of contact. Half an hour later, agents would have checked his flat and begun to go through hours of CCTV footage and before the hour was up they would know for certain he was kidnapped. After that it shouldn't take more than six hours at the most to locate him, formulate a plan, and finally rescue their Q. Breathe.

Yes, Q had lots of confidence in his colleagues locating him. The thing he didn't have was time. Q always took his suppressant at precisely 0845. On work days, he left them in his top drawer so he remembered to have them with his morning coffee. On his days off, he would take them home and set his alarm for 0840 so he could take it with a sip of water then go back to sleep for another couple of hours. Unfortunately, suppressants were a new drug. Only really started being available around 10 years ago when Omegas started getting more rights and more ambitious. Suppressants allowed Omegas to get better jobs and keep them without the added pressures of heats, families, or Alphas. They weren't the best. Forgetting to take your suppressant would force you into heat. The longer you had been on suppressants, the less time you had to take one to stop your heat coming on. It was recommended that you allowed yourself controlled heats at least once a year. Q hadn't had a heat in, oh, nigh on 10 years. He had until midday to take his suppressant or he was screwed... And would most likely be screwed by his captives.

It was 1234 when the first wave hit him. His body felt on fire, which was impossible. The cellar which his kidnappers had shoved him in was freezing. If he wasn't rescued in 36 minutes he was never going to get back to his flat before the full force of his heat hit him.

37 minutes later Q heard the tell-tale thumps of unconscious bodies dropping to the floor. Once all three of his kidnappers were down, the cellar door was kicked open and 007 descended the stairs. Great, they'd sent an Alpha. Fucking idiots. Bond used a pocket knife (one of Q-Branches own creations with a specially added laser) to cut the ropes round his wrists and his gag.

"Are you alright?" Bond asked, hands on both of Q's shoulders, grey eyes checking over his body for injuries. He was certainly not alright. He could feel that the second wave was about to hit.

"Do you have a car?" he asked Bond as he stood up, trying not to panic too much. Bond was an Alpha. His mind was screaming at him to get away from him but his body was telling him that he was all he needed. Double-oh nodded. "I need to get home."

Q thought Bond must have realised what was happening. Or perhaps someone had had enough sense to warn him but not enough sense to send a Beta. The agent didn't say anything when Q's second wave hit half way up the stairs, he didn't say anything as he carried Q to the car, and thankfully he didn't say anything while Q moaned and writhed on the back seat. He was wet now; Bond must be able to smell him.

"Where are we?" Q croaked out as the confusion lifted. Bond was silent, but Q saw his eyes drift to his Tom Tom.

"How long do you think you have?" The hitched note in 007's voice didn't exactly instil him with confidence.

"I don't know. How long was that wave?" Q tried to even out his breathing and decided to remain lying down for the rest of the journey. Plus, he was pretty sure he didn't have the energy to sit up.

"You've been out of it for 20 minutes, Q," Bond told him solemnly.

"I don't have long then."

"Neither do I."

Bond pulled the car up outside the back entrance to Q's flat a few minutes later. Q couldn't even speak by this point. He felt paralysed with fear. His heat was upon him and he wasn't prepared at all. He felt himself being pulled out the car and groaned. Bond slung him over his shoulder and ran into the block, skidding into the lift; Q was pretty sure he heard the man growl at someone as he shouted, "Hold the lift."

"What floor?"

"Eight. Keys are in my pocket." He felt Bonds hands locating his keys. He vaguely remembers being in the lift but he most definitely remembers Bond throwing him down onto his bed. That's when his heat hit.

Bond growled half way across the room and stopped. He didn't turn around though. Q saw the man's fists clench at his side and a vein bulging in his neck. "Please."

One word; that was all it took and Bond was back across the room in a heartbeat. He pushed Q down on the sheets and mashed their mouths together. The rest was history. Well, that's what Q says anyway. To be brutally honest, he can't remember a damn thing. Most first heats with one's Alpha went that way. Q's used to older Omegas patting his shoulder or head and telling him 'it'll get better'.

Q's not so sure he wants it to get better. He's not sure he wants to remember how much he begged for Bond. He's not sure he wants to know how much he pleaded for the agent's cock. He's not sure he wants to remember how loud he screamed when James first knotted in him. He's definitely sure that he doesn't want to remember when he started referring to 'Bond' as 'James'. He wondered if any of his predecessors had mated with one of MI6's most dangerous agents; Q seriously doubted it.


	3. Chapter 3

Q hadn't woken up till 0918 the next day. It took him only a couple of seconds to realise that it was the continuous buzzing of his phone that had woken him.

"Q," he answered, as professional as he could sound when one had just been woken up... Besides, Q didn't get personal calls.

"Q, it's Eve. I'm at your door. Let me in, would you?" Q sighs. He's not really in the mood to be entertaining guests.

"Two minutes," he tells her before terminating the call. Q pulls on a navy blue cardigan over his pinstriped pyjamas and trudges to the front door as if he's walking to his death. "Moneypenny," he greets when he opens the door, stepping to one side so she can enter.

"Morning, Q. I'm here to debrief you." She breezes through his flat with two Starbucks takeaway cups and sits herself at his glass dining table, gesturing at the seat across from her.

"Shouldn't M be doing this? I am his Quartermaster, after all." Q takes a sip of the Starbucks that's just been pushed in front of him, almost moaning when he realises it's a Gingerbread Latte; Moneypenny smirked across at him.

"Bond went all territorial on him this morning; told him under no circumstances was M to enter this flat without 007 being present." Q felt his jaw going a little slack. "We thought about sending Tanner but decided it would be better all round if it was another Omega."

"He can't tell M that he can't debrief me without his presence, can he?" The injustice of it all.

"He can tell any Alpha he wants to stay away from you. Boss or no Boss; you're his Omega, Q." Q just rolled his eyes. "M wants me to makes it clear that you aren't to do any work over the next two weeks, and if he finds you in the system, he'll have 007 confiscate your laptop. Before you say anything, Bond was all for having your laptop locked away in a secret location with immediate effect but M managed to talk him into giving you a chance."

"I don't get what the big deal is?" He refuses to believe he huffs like a child after that statement.

"Oh, Sweetie." Moneypenny reaches over to give his hand a squeeze. "The first couple of weeks are hard after an Omega's mated for a first time. Trust me. It's a pile of bullcrap too that Alphas don't get it half as bad as us. At the minute there are so many hormones running amok about your body that you simply can't function to your full potential. MI6 needs a Quartermaster who's thinking straight. It's better in the long run if you take these two weeks to get yourself part-way back to normal, then come back to work."

"Alright, I get it. I promise, no hacking into the system." Q held his hands up in surrender.

"Excellent. You'll be happy to know that Bond's been grounded for at least three months. Stuck back in training." She checks her phone briefly before standing up.

"James Bond has been grounded?"

"Yes, well you can't really expect a newly mated Alpha to make rational decisions out on the field, can you? Then again, when has Bond ever made rational decisions." Eve squeezed his shoulder as she passed him. "Get some more sleep. It helps." With that she was gone, leaving Q to ponder what he was going to do for the next two weeks. Perhaps a break from work would do him some good.

Q spent the rest of the day in limbo between sleeping and trying to decide what he should make for dinner... Okay, he may have also have tried to figure out a way to work on the systems without M finding out. He hadn't thought of one... yet.

After deciding on a lasagne for dinner, he gave himself a little reality check when he realised that his current baking dish was only big enough for one person. He had an Alpha to cook for now, too. Luckily, one of the reasons Q chose this flat was because it was a 10 minute walk from the nearest shopping precinct just encase he needed to nip out for some extra wires or a light bulb or perhaps some phosphorus. He wasn't gone more than an hour, even though the sales lady at John Lewis had talked him into quite a few new kitchen essentials which had put him back around £300. He'd heard it said that you should always go for quality over the price tag because in the end you'd get more for your money. Q fumbled around with his key whilst trying to keep hold of his bags when the door was flung open by a disgruntled looking 007.

"Where have you been?" Bond's voice was gruff, as if he was struggling to keep control over it.

"Shopping," Q told him, gesturing at the bags in his hand which the blonde immediately started to take from him. This irritated Q a little; he'd just carried the bags from the precinct. He was sure he could manage carrying them from the front door to the kitchen. "Needed new kitchen items now there's not just me to cook for."

"I've brought back Indian," Bond informed him, nodding to a brown takeaway bag on the dinning table. So much for the pasta then. Q had read about this sort of behaviour in Alphas when they were first mated; the desire to provide for their mate. He should tread carefully.

"Thank you. Indian's my favourite, though perhaps tomorrow night you'll let me cook for you? The mince is going to go off otherwise." Q almost smirked at his own slyness.

"I'm off tomorrow." Bond put the bags on the kitchen side and made a move to put the items away but then seemed to think better of it. Tidying was usually the Omega's job. He did grab two plates from the cupboard and brought them over to the table where Q was already seated patiently. "I'll make a mince stew."

Oh well, it was worth the try. "I've heard that you've been grounded." Q tried to sound nonchalant as he tucked into his Chicken Korma. Bond's eyes flashed angrily for a moment before he managed to shrug.

"M's decision. Medical's assessment wasn't great either. They've decided that I should only work 'part-time' while you're on 'leave'."_Ha!_thought Q; who's laughing now. Bond was sulking at the injustice of being forced to work part-time as his Omega was off work, while everyone seemed to think it was perfectly fine that Q not be allowed to work at all.

Q meant to respond with a snide remark about the injustice of not being allowed to work but instead; "It's only two weeks; we'll manage." Where had that come from? Bond seemed to relax a little at his words though.

"You're right. Perhaps a little rest will do me some good. I..." Bond stopped and looked at the window, and if Q didn't know any better, he'd say the man was embarrassed.

"You..." he prompted, eager to hear what the man had to say.

"I found it difficult being parted from you today." The blonde continued to stare out of the window, which Q was extremely glad of, seeing as his cheeks had heated up and most likely looked extremely unattractive.

"It's normal for an Alpha to feel that way, 007. Separation anxiety; you're worried another Alpha might claim me while you're gone." Bond growled at this, slamming his hand down on the table.

"You're mine!" the man shouted and Q immediately ducked his head as a sign of submission. How stupid of him to discuss being claimed by another Alpha.

"I'm yours, James," Q said meekly. They remained that way for a few minutes; Q with his head down and Bond watching him. Thankfully, the man's breathing evened and he excused himself from the table.

"Goodnight," Bond called, just before his bedroom door shut.

Shit; Q really needed to pull himself together. He cleared the table and put away the new kitchen items before going to bed himself. There was a lot of tossing and turning that night before he finally fell into a fitful sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

The next couple of weeks were... difficult. Though somehow the pair of them had managed and had fallen into something like a routine. On the days that James went to work, Q stayed in bed until it was almost afternoon. After he finally dragged himself out of his pit, he would spend his day catching up on the latest computer games he'd missed out on with not having time usually due to his long hours. He tried to cook dinner on those nights as it was what was expected of him; Q had never been the best cook. James would come home around 8pm; they would eat, talk about work, and then sit down for the 10 o'clock news. No, the days that 007 was at headquarters were fine; it was the days that he was at the flat that caused the issues.

Bond would wake Q up at 0930 with a cooked breakfast (Q had him pegged as a feeder and would be trying out some of Q-branches new gadgets if his pants stopped fitting him). By this time he had already been out for a run (MI6 field agents didn't jog), read the morning's paper, and completed a safety sweep of the flat. Yes, living with 007 made Q feel quite lazy and he had always thought himself an early bird; on the 6th day the Alpha had told him his late starts to his days were down to his body trying to get back to some semblance of normality after their mating. By midday, they were so under each other's feet that Q usually suggested a trip out. The first day they had gone for a coffee, but they had to leave before they got to the counter when Bond started growling at the other Alphas. For the rest of the first week, Q decided it was better to go for walks until the blonde haired man's instincts settled down a bit. By the end of the second week, they had been able to sit through a coffee in a busy London Starbucks without any incidents.

Q's two weeks were up and as much as he loved his job, he really wasn't looking forward to returning to work. There were a few reasons really. A) Everyone would want to know all about their mating. B) Everyone would want to know what being with THE James Bond was like. C) James Bond would be there, amongst his colleagues, growling at his interns, and just generally being a pest.

Q could feel his face heat up with the thought of the embarrassing situations he was going to find himself in over the coming days. He heard the key in the lock only a second before Bond entered. Q pretended to be too distracted by his laptop to look up.

"Here." The man placed a black rectangular box next to him on the sofa, forcing Q to look at him. Bond was already done shrugging his coat off and was heading to his room, presumably to get dressed. Balancing the laptop precariously on the arm of the sofa probably wasn't the best idea but James had just presented him with a gift; a real gift this time, not the takeaways or the tea he had brought home but an actual expensively boxed looking gift. Q hadn't received a proper gift in years.

He peeled back the lid, slowly savouring the moment. Inside the box Q found a beautiful pair of navy blue cashmere gloves and matching scarf. He stroked his hand across the scarf, revelling in the softness. "There was a matching hat too but..." 007 paused to catch the laptop which had been dislodged when Q jumped, not realising the man had reinterred the room. "Well, I wasn't sure about your hair."

"My hair?" he asked, watching Bond carefully place the laptop on the floor, then head towards the kitchen; Q felt a little guilty for not making dinner now.

"I wasn't sure if a hat would mess it up." Q stared after him, perplexed; Bond thought he styled his hair like this? It was lucky if he made it to the hairdressers, never mind getting a comb run through it.

"I... I. Urgh, never-mind. Thank you for these, they really are lovely." Bond didn't reply, not that Q expected him to.

The next morning, Q was surprised to find 007 waiting for him by the front door when he emerged from his room.

"I thought you'd be long gone by now, 007," Q commented before taking the coat the agent offered him, finding his new gloves in the pocket.

"It wouldn't make much sense for us to travel alone. Plus, you don't have a great previous track record when it comes to getting to work on your own." He tried not to blush as Bond paced the cashmere scarf around his neck before turning and opening the front door.

"That only happened once."

"Once is enough for me, Q."

The tube station was busy, so Q wasn't surprised when he felt James' hand on the small of his back guiding him through the crowd. He had done this a couple of times before in busy places, as if he were worried he might lose track of Q in the crowd. What did surprise Q was Bond pushing him up against the carriage wall and standing in front of him like a bodyguard. To be fair to the man, he hadn't had the best experiences on the London Underground. Q didn't dare trust himself to speak until they were out of Vauxhall station and in the sites of headquarters.

"Perhaps we should invest in a car."

"Agreed." Bond had his eyes on the traffic as they crossed.

"I can't drive."

"I can."

After 007 had dropped him off at his desk and disappeared to do whatever he did while grounded, Q found himself trawling the internet for cars. It wasn't until Bond came to collect him at lunch to take him to the canteen that he realised that not one person had asked him about his recent mating. He passed James the print outs of some of the cars he had been looking at, taking the opportunity to look around the busy canteen. No one had sat at any of the tables within five meters of them and it seemed as though everyone was being extra careful not to look their way. Bond had warned them off. He noticed the man watching him and narrowed his eyes. 007 just shrugged as though it was nothing out of the ordinary to warn off the whole of MI6.


	5. Chapter 5

Car shopping. Not exactly one of Q's greatest past times, not that he had ever tried it before. He wasn't quite sure he could cope with another day, never mind another week, on public transport. Q didn't profess to know much at all about cars; Q-Branch had a 'car man' who decided on the best equipped cars for each individual mission. James, on the other hand, knew his cars like Q knew his motherboards. He'd given up trying to follow what the salesman was saying in answer to Bond's endless questions. Every so often he would turn to Q and ask him what he thought of this car or that one and Q would respond by making comment on the shape or interior and the two Alphas would smirk. Fucking Alphas.

"The Rapide perhaps. Five doors, big boot, yet still sporty. Perfect family car for a man like you." Q paled then; not really sure what worried him most – a family sports car or just the thought of a family in general... In a sports car. Bond watched him for a moment before continuing on through the show room. "Perhaps not then," the salesman muttered before following 007.

"The DB9." Bond's voice took on a much more sultry tone and began circling a sleek looking Aston Martin, running his hand across where Q assumed the engine would be. "Timeless."

The Quartermaster almost rolled his eyes, hearing Bond's whispered appreciation for the car. He wasn't really sure what was so timeless about it as this was probably the most modern car that he had ever seen, but then again what did he know.

"You're a DB fan?" the salesman asked Bond.

"Yes. Very much so. Q?" The blonde glanced at him.

"It's up to you, James. Cars really aren't my forte." To be honest Q would be happy with anything that the salesman wasn't pegging as a family car.

"This then. How would you prefer us to pay?" And as easy as that, they had set themselves back £132 grand. Well Bond had. Q didn't have that sort of money lying about whereas the money that MI6 had made from selling off Bond's estate - and it was a very large estate - had been 'gifted' to him after Skyfall. Q had hacked his file (long before they mated) and he knew Bond was the heir to some family whose records seemed to have been wiped; he could find them if he wanted but Q respected the man's privacy.

The car wouldn't be ready for at least another month so in the mean time the pair decided to get a taxi back to the flat.

"You know, we could just use one of MI6's numerous fancy sports cars," he pointed out while hanging up his jacket.

"I would prefer to own our own car."

"I was sort of hoping we could bring it home with us." Q thought wistfully about heading to work in style. He looked over at Bond who had poured himself a whiskey and lent against the kitchen counter watching his Quartermaster Omega. "Oh well; back to the Tube tomorrow."

"We'll get a taxi. Then at lunch we'll take a trip down to the basement to pick out a car to use for the next month until ours is ready." Bond downed his whiskey then headed for his room. "I'm going for a shower - shout if you need me."

Perhaps this was the first plus point to having an Alpha - being chauffeured to and from work. Many Omegas never bothered to learn to drive as transport was seen as something that was provided to Omegas by their Alphas. It was a long outdated notion but unfortunately Omegas weren't usually encouraged on to the roads by their parents, and even if they did decide to learn, it was a bit if a struggle to find a driving instructor who wasn't an Alpha and it wouldn't be the best idea to be taught one-to-one by an Alpha. Driving was most definitely an Alpha thing.

When Bond wasn't hidden away within the deep recesses of MI6 'training' he could usually be found loitering in Q-Branch, much to the resident Quartermaster's dismay. Q was often so enthralled in whatever he was doing that he often wouldn't even notice the man had entered his office (to be honest it was the same with the other double-oh agents) and he would jump out of his skin when the man finally cleared his throat. If Q was honest with himself he had, at first, hated the fact that Bond spent his (free?) time in his territory. Though after he got used to the blonde being there, he began to enjoy watching the man weave between the desks, giving the staff tips on how to improve whatever gadget they happened to be working on. Perhaps, although he would never admit it, Q also began to feel his territory was missing something whenever Bond was elsewhere.

On a few occasions Bond had turned up for lunch but had found that Q was far too busy to leave. Once, Bond had asked if he could "do that later" and Q had snapped that, "No, I can't just drop hacking into the emails of a suspected leader of a cyber terrorist organisation." After that, if Q looked busy Bond would turn right back round and collect their lunches from the canteen and leave him to it. Unfortunately that usually meant he would shoo one of the interns whose desk happened to give Bond the best view of Q's office and eat his lunch there while keeping an eye on Q. That infuriated him only slightly.

It was a funny little routine they found themselves in, but it was a structured routine, so Q was quite surprised when he noticed 007 standing stiffly in the middle of his office at 0934 one morning. Bond never bothered him before midday. Q dismissed 'car man', who had just been showing him the latest batch of cars they'd just had delivered and was now explaining which sort of missions he thought they'd be perfect for, with a wave of his hand. Q-Branch seemed a little 'out of sorts', most likely due to Bonds unnatural morning presence. When he entered his office he closed the door and pressed the button which made the glass opaque from the outside yet allowed him to still see out. He turned to Bond and waited patiently, arms folded.

"M's given us two days leave, starting now," Bond told him while walking over to collect his coat from the hook on the door.

"For any particular reason?" Q didn't move to take his coat from the man.

"I've got to go on a mission." Bonds arm remained outstretched and his jaw set tight.

"And I was under the impression you were grounded." Q finally did take the coat from Bond but didn't put it on.

"I'd been infiltrating a mob for a while before this..." Bond gestured between them. "The situation's changed. It's best if I'm sent in to take care of things before they get out of hand." Translated; group of power-hungry mobsters have got a little too big for their boots and are probably planning to kidnap the Duchess of Cornwall or something and it's best for everyone involved (apart from the mob members) if Bond were sent in to kill off the leader.

"How long will you be gone?" Q put his coat on.

"A week, maybe two. It's UK based, but I'll be undercover." Q just nodded.

"And why the two days off? Surely you're going to need some equipment."

"There are other people here who can help me with my equipment. I need to make sure you'll be alright on your own."

"I managed fine before you and I'm confident I can manage on my own for two weeks, James." His cheeks had heated up with anger. God damn this man for making him feel like such an idiot.

"Please, Q, just humour me?" 007 gestured to the door; Q sighed but headed out of his office all the same. M would be hearing about this; two days off?

Bond woke Q up at 0630 on the morning he was to leave for his mission. He stared at the blurry figure sat on the edge of his bed.

"I'm leaving now."

"Alright," Q replied stupidly. Well, what did the man want him to say? They'd prepared for Bond's departure well enough. A car from MI6 would take him to and from work every day, as Bond wasn't happy with him taking the Tube alone. If wanted to leave the flat on his days off he could, but he had to let Bond know where he was going and what time he was due back to the flat. When he returned to the flat, Q would send one of their specially devised code words that they had decided on. For example, on a Monday Q would text Bond 'Arctic Cleaver' to let the man know he had returned home safely. Q had improved the security features on Bonds phone to a standard which ensured it could only be used by the double-oh. If anyone else tried to input a pass code on the phone, unless they used Bonds thumb to do so and cracked it on their first or second attempt, it would blow up. Bond had bought at least a month's supply of food even though Q had assured him that he was perfectly capable of shopping for himself.

Now Bond was actually leaving and all they could do was stare at each other across the bed. Then the man reached over and squeezed Q's nondescript bicep. "I'll see you soon."

"Okay," Q replied, as Bond nodded and left the room. Well, that was possibly one of the more awkward moments they had shared; perhaps things such as that would get better over time. He shrugged the whole ordeal off and decided to get showered and ready for work. Perhaps he would check in with Bond's handler at lunch; only to make sure the agent had been supplied with the correct equipment in his absence. Nothing wrong with that. It was in his job description to make sure that all the operatives in Q-Branch were doing their jobs correctly.


	6. Chapter 6

At work. Q  
29/11/12 8.43am

Home. Austria Wok. Q  
29/11/12 18.18pm

You forgot the code words  
in your first message. J  
29/11/12 18.18pm

So I did. Sorry won't  
happen again. Q  
29/11/12 18.32pm

Are you ok? J  
30/11/12 23.34pm

Yes... Well I was until  
your text woke me up. Q  
30/11/12 23.36pm

Haven't heard from you  
today. J  
30/11/12 23.40pm

Perhaps that's because I  
haven't left the flat? Q  
30/11/12 23.43pm

Night, Q. J  
30/11/12 23.46pm

At work. Asia donkey. Q  
1/12/12 8.37am

Home. Asia fork. Q  
1/12/12 19.42pm

Going out for dinner. Q  
1/12/12 20.12pm

There's food in the fridge.  
Why do you need to go  
out for dinner? J  
1/12/12 20.14pm

I feel like sushi. Q  
1/12/12 20.17pm

Home. Asia fork. Q  
1/12/12 21.43pm

How was the sushi? J  
1/12/12 22.14pm

Rubbish. Wish I'd  
stayed in. Off tomorrow.  
How's your mission? Q  
1/12/12 22.26pm

Taking longer than I had  
hoped. J  
1/12/12 22.54pm

That's a bum. Q  
1/12/12 23.15pm

Just realised how  
boring my life was  
without you around. Q  
2/12/12 21.23pm

At work. Arctic cleaver. Q  
3/12/12 8.38am

Home. Arctic dagger. Q  
3/12/12 4.34pm

At work. Emergency.  
Arctic dog. Q  
3/12/12 22.45pm

Shit. Got code confused.  
Arctic gun. Also realised  
I should have text before  
I set off. Sorry. Q  
3/12/12 23.04pm

Home. V tired. Q  
4/12/12 3.56am

England gold. Fucking  
code. Q  
4/12/12 3.58am

Day off? J  
5/12/12 8.55am

Got up late. In car now.  
Body clocks fucked  
after other night. Q  
5/12/12 8.57am

At work. Morocco sabre.  
You been busy? Q  
5/12/12 9.14am

Situations been... Delicate.  
At the hotel all day today. J  
5/12/12 9.22am

Any closer? Q  
5/12/12 9.43am

Not really. Tonight's quite  
important. J  
5/12/12 10.12am

Good luck then. Q  
5/12/12 10.32am

I won't need it. J  
5/12/12 10.34am

Watch it, 007. Your  
ego is showing. Q  
5/12/12 10.42am

Nothing wrong with having  
confidence in my abilities. J  
5/12/12 11.05am

Speaking of abilities,  
or abilities that you lack.  
How is my equipment  
doing? Q  
5/12/12 11.34am

All safe. Earpiece might  
be accidentally misplaced  
soon. J  
5/12/12 11.53am

Mercer? Q  
5/12/12 12.16pm

Mercer. He panics too  
much. J  
5/12/12 12.34pm

Give him a chance. He  
might be a bit of a worry  
wart but he's new and  
you have a reputation. Q  
5/12/12 13.54pm

Reputation? I don't know  
what you mean. J  
5/12/12 14.17pm

That made me LOL  
in a meeting with M!  
He wasn't best pleased  
with me. I should stop  
texting. Q  
5/12/12 15.02pm

Just you and M? J  
5/12/12 15.03pm

Like he'd dare defy  
his most dangerous  
agents demands. Eve  
was there too. And before  
You even think it no other  
Alphas have been alone  
with me. All the 00 agents  
have been bringing Tanner  
with them to Q-Branch. I  
don't even want to know  
what you threatened them  
with. Q  
5/12/12 15.13pm

At home. Morocco laser.  
Good luck. Q  
5/12/12 18.47pm

At work. France treaty. Q  
6/12/12 8.36am

Home. France war. Q  
6/12/12 19.34pm

At work. Italy paint. Q  
7/12/12 8.45am

Home. Italy wallpaper. Q  
7/12/12 17.54pm

Going Christmas shopping  
as I've got to get my Secret  
Santa. Office Christmas  
party next week. Do the  
00 agents do a Secret  
Santa? Q  
8/12/12 10.23am

Home. Russia rain.  
Shopping success. Q  
8/12/12 14.48pm

No we don't do a Secret  
Santa and if that was an  
invite to your Christmas  
party then I accept. J  
8/12/12 15.12pm

Well it wasn't a invite  
asI just assumed you  
would be there. Q  
8/12/12 15.24pm

I'll be home soon. J  
8/12/12 23.43pm

You woke me up.  
Again. Q  
8/12/12 23.46pm

Sorry. Just got in. J  
8/12/12 23.53pm

At work. Spain foot.  
Just walked past  
Mercers desk. He looks  
stressed. I hope that isn't  
your doing. Q  
9/12/12 8.34am

Send him a virus from me  
will you? J  
9/12/12 8.43am

That would be an act of  
terrorism you know? Q  
9/12/12 8.47am

Mercers just told me  
you've been AWOL for  
43mins. I hope you haven't  
damaged any of my  
equipment? Q  
9/12/12 10.23am

Headsets beyond repair  
I fear. J  
9/12/12 11.54am

I've perfected the new  
modal while you've been  
gone anyway. Q  
9/12/12 12.13pm

Tell Mercer I'm heading  
back to HQ. J  
9/12/12 15.26pm


	7. Chapter 7

When Q received the last text from Bond, he was already at Mercers desk trying to help the man locate his Alpha by hacking into CCTV cameras located in the area that agent was last known to be. The man was completely off the grid. When he read the text, his shoulders sagged a little bit with relief.

"He's on his way back," Q told Mercer, stepping away from the man's desk.

"You found him? How?" the sandy haired beta cried, peering at his computer screen, trying to spot Bonds tracker on the map that Q had been studying; a map that Q certainly wasn't going to admit hacking into a couple of times over the last 10 days.

"He texted me," Q told the man, dead panned, and giving a little wave of his phone.

"Oh." Mercer looked as though he wanted to say something else but held his tongue.

"Well, I'll be going then." Q turned on his heel and headed back to Q-branch. It was silly to feel the way he did, but the Omega couldn't quite help it. He knew before today that Bond was probably going to go in for the kill and would be coming home, but to have the man confirm it himself was something else.

It was business as usual at Q-branch but its Quartermaster couldn't quite concentrate. He was contemplating going to M's office to see if he could catch Bond before his debriefing, but that would be a bit ridiculous; wouldn't it? These Omega thoughts were so very confusing. He'd just spent 10 days without his Alpha... What would an extra half an hour do? He plugged in the latest USB stick he was supposed to be analysing when he heard the door to Q-branch open followed by a collective murmur from the staff. Q looked up from his screen slowly, knowing what he was going to see. Bond. A very battered and bruised James Bond. The man stormed into his office sporting a swollen eye with a small nick underneath probably from a ring that whoever had hit him was wearing. His left sleeve was soaked with blood and his right arm was clutching at his chest.

"What are you doing here, you should be in medical!" Q cried, coming around the desk to meet Bond. He reached out to the man but then thought better of it, as he wasn't sure where his injuries where.

"I wanted to make sure you where alright before M locks me away with paperwork for the rest of the day." Q-branch's doors were flung open again, admitting one of MI6's doctors, two nurses, M, Tanner, and Mercer. "Already? I thought I'd been a bit more inconspicuous than that."

Q stifled a giggle at Bonds dry wit and couldn't hold back a smirk when Bond was pushed down into a chair. "Where are you hurt, Bond?"

Bond batted the doctor away. "There's nothing you can do for me. I've two cracked ribs, a cut on my left arm not deep enough for stitches, and a soon-to-be black eye. Just give me some painkillers and go back to whatever it is you do all day."

"James!" Q admonished.

"007, these people are here to help." Mercer looked as though he was going to continue when Bond cut him off.

"I'm fine!" Bond stood up, pushing the doctor who was trying to take off his shirt to examine where the blood was coming from. He moved towards Q and stupidly the Doctor moved to follow. Q was flung behind a growling Bond's back before he knew it and M was throwing the young Doctor out of his office.

"Are you a complete idiot? They're newly mated and have been separated for 10 days. Did you even go to medical school?" The doctor paled and averted his eyes away from Bond and Q as a sign of surrender. "Get out of here." The doctor didn't need to be told twice but even after he'd left Q-Branch, 007 kept Q held behind him.

M sighed and rubbed his face. "Q, take him home and calm him down; I want you both fit to return to work in four days. You two." M nodded to the nurses. "Get 007 some painkillers." The two girls scampered off, clearly happy to be dismissed from the situation.

"What about the paperwork, Sir?" Mercer asked from where he was stood behind Tanner.

"Email it to Q; he'll make sure Bond has it filled in by 5pm tomorrow." With that, M turned on his heel and stormed through Q-Branch with Tanner and Mercer hot on his heels. "Oh, and Tanner, note this down. If anyone else from MI6 happens to mate then they're let go immediately. I refuse to go through this bollocks again."

"Can he do that?" Q asked Bond when the man finally let him go.

"No. It's against the law."

"Come on then. Can you drive?" Q moved from behind his Alpha.

"Of course."

Moneypenny met the pair at their borrowed MI6 car with a box of painkillers and a small basic first aid box. She smirked at them both. "The nurses were too afraid to come themselves. What did you do to them, Bond? M looked frightful when he came back too."

"I didn't do anything," Bond clarified, climbing into the car, leaving Q to deal with Moneypenny.

"Thanks for this." Q waved the painkillers and first aid box at her.

"Go on. I'll email when he calms down." Q nodded and joined James in the car.

When they arrived back at the flat, Q went straight for the kettle but Bond caught his wrist. "Help me?" Q just nodded and followed Bond into his room. He busied himself by collecting some warm water and a cloth while the man took his shirt off; Q couldn't help but blush a little when he returned to find Bond shirtless and waiting for him.

He washed the blood off Bond's arm and dressed the wound. The cut was probably deep enough for stitches but Q was no doctor, so he settled with the butterfly stitches he had found in the first aid box. He cleaned off the nick under the man eye too with an antiseptic wipe. He felt Bonds hand creep to the back of his neck but chose to ignore it, though when he tried to pull away the hand clamped down, stopping him. Their breaths mingled together as Bond pulled Q towards him so that their foreheads rested against each other.

"James," Q pleaded with the Alpha, confused again, not sure if he was pleading for the man to let him go or asking to be kissed.

"I'm sorry. Would you lie down with me?" Bond pulled away as Q nodded. They both climbed on to the bed, though Q felt terribly awkward, they lay down side by side and Bond took his hand.

"Tell me about your mission." And Bond did; he carried on long after Q had fallen asleep and after he had finished he too fell into the most peaceful sleep that he had had in ages.


	8. Chapter 8

Bond wasn't awake when the mid-morning winter sun that was streaming into the room woke Q. He fumbled about for his glasses, which seemed to have fallen off his face during the night, finding them under his pillow; thank goodness he hadn't bent them. Q got up to pour himself a glass of water from the kitchen, deciding he'd better get one for Bond too. When he returned to the man's bedroom, the intense gaze of Bond's steely blue eyes stopped him at the doorway.

"Here, I thought you might want to take some painkillers when you woke up." Q walked over and placed the glass on the side table, watching as the man took out a couple of the painkillers and popped them in his mouth, but instead of taking them with the water he ground them down with his molars before swallowing. Is that the way real men take painkillers so as not to look wimpy? "Perhaps not, then."

Q's efforts didn't go to waste though; the blonde drank down the whole glass of water before flopping back down on the bed, flinging an arm over his eyes. "Close the blinds, will you?" His voice was gruff, and even though Q rolled his eyes at the demand, he did as Bond asked. "Come back to bed."

"Are you going to be making demands of me all day, 007?" Q asked as he lay back down, feeling as awkward as he had felt last night.

"Yes." Only a blind man would miss the smirk on the agent's face.

"We should think about doing your paperwork."

"Paperwork," Bond scoffed. "Bloody waste of time."

"I'll be able to do most of it from what I remember you telling me from last night. You can fill in the blanks." They lay in silence for a couple of minutes; Q staring at the ceiling chancing glances at his Alpha.

"Bond?"

"Mmm?"

"What am I doing in your bed?"

"At the moment you're lying on top of the duvet talking incessantly to me even though I'm making it quite obvious that I'm trying to sleep."

Q was pretty sure Bond could hear his eyes roll as he let out a sigh before muttering, "Incessant? Bit of an over-exaggeration."

"You're here as I can't be bothered moving and I'd quite like you within my sights for a day or so," Bond informed him, choosing to ignore Q's comment.

"That's a... reasonable explanation."

"Q?"

"Yes, Bond."

"Go back to sleep."

Later, well around midday, they got up and moved to the living room. Q turned the heating up and Bond brewed the Earl Grey. They settled on the sofa with the teapot on the coffee table keeping warm with a green woollen tea cosy. They were seated at opposite ends of the sofa; Bond on his phone and Q writing up the man's mission report with occasional input from the agent himself. "Done. I'll just email this to Mercer then, shall I?"

"Please do. Then delete my number from his phone."

"He's texted me a few times too."

"Dare I apply the word incessant to his texting." Q laughed then; Bond wasn't one to let something just slide. Once the email was sent Q placed his laptop on the coffee table waiting for the inevitable reply.

"I saw Skyfall, you know, in your file when I was laying the tracks for Silva. It was a beautiful house. I'm sorry you had to blow it up."

"I'm not." Bond flicked on the telly.

"Bad memories?"

"Memories."

"I'm still sorry." Q poured himself another cup as Bond's attention was captured by BBC News. He was beginning to think that the man had a slight obsession with knowing what was going on in the world at all times.

"Is that the sort of place you would like to live?" Bond spared him a thoughtful glance. "We could, if you wanted?"

"Live at Skyfall..."

"Skyfall's gone. I meant a house like that?"

"In London?" Q frowned. What was the man talking about.

"Outside of London." Bond gave him a sidelong look.

"But what about work? We couldn't live outside London; the commute would be too much if there's an emergency." Q imitated picking up his phone and holding it to his ear. "Hi M. Oh, the Queen's been kidnapped; how terrible. Yes, your Quartermaster and best double-oh will be there in around 50-90 minutes, depending on traffic."

"You won't be working when you..." Bond trailed off, frowning at Q.

"When I what?" Q's heart did a little flip, hoping that Bond wasn't suggesting what he thought he was suggesting.

"When you..." Bond was cut off when Q jumped, up spilling his tea on the floor.

"Don't say it." He held his hands up as Bond stood up too. Q felt like a bucket of cold water had just been thrown over his head.

"Q? What's wrong with you?" The blonde's frown had taken on a level that Q had never seen before.

"I can't, Bond. I'm not..." He waved his hand about, trying to grasp the word. "Ready! I'm not ready for that."

"You're not?" Bond picked to cup up from the floor. "Sit down."

Q did. He sat down and watched Bond clean the spilt tea up and mulled their discussion over. Bond expected him to quit work?

"I'm not giving up my career, James." Bond gave him a withering look clearly saying he'd had enough of the conversation. He left the room to take their tea set to the kitchen. Q's blood was boiling. Did he really have any say in any of this?

"I'm going for a shower," Q shouted into the kitchen, before fleeing to his room and slamming the door behind him. Would Bond really make him have children and give up his career to bring them up?

When Q finally emerged from his room much, much later, Bond was sat patiently waiting for him on the sofa.

"I think we got our wires crossed somewhere."

"I don't think we did. You want us to move out of London to bring up your children. You want me to give up my career. I know I can't deny you your wishes but it doesn't mean I have to like them." Q stared his Alpha down, red cheeked, and breathing erratically.

"Calm down and shut the hell up for one god damn minute." Q did. Well he didn't have a choice there either, did he. "I thought you were bringing up houses as a way to suggest having children. I didn't realise you where so against it... Omegas want children - it's the way they're programmed. I just wanted to provide for you," Bond reasoned.

"So you're not going to get me pregnant," Q squeaked uncertainly, sitting down heavily.

"Not if you don't want me to, no." Bond let out a short laugh. "I have to confess that I've never had much desire to sire children."

"Well, that's a relief." It felt as though the tension left him at once and he moulded himself more comfortably on the chair. "You'd expect me to leave work though, if I did have kids?"

"No, of course not. I just assumed that's what you'd want to do. I thought I was telling you what you wanted to hear." Q nodded in understanding. An Alpha would do almost anything to make their Omega happy. He supposed it was actually quite touching that Bond would have children with him just because Q wanted them... Stupid, but touching.

"And you don't want to move out of London."

"God, no."

"Oh... Well, good." Q nodded. "Oh, before I forget. The car's ready to be picked up."

"We'll collect it in the morning." And just like that it was business as usual... Well, apart from Bond climbing into Q's bed later that night with a shrug at the Omega's questioning look. "I still feel as though another Alpha's going to climb through your window at any given moment."

"Alright, but if you're not over it by tomorrow night, you're on the floor."


	9. Chapter 9

Q loved their new car, not that he was going to admit that to Bond. It was sporty and stylish on the outside and the inside was all leather and buttons... Q loved buttons (and leather). Almost all he thought about for the rest of their leave was what gadgets he could fit out the car with once they were back at headquarters.

That's where Bond found him at lunch on their first day back; in the basement car park with the bonnet up and front bumper off the car.

"I hope you're being careful." Q scoffed at that; he was sure that James would have to look up the word 'careful' to explain it.

"Says the man who hardly ever returns MY equipment," Q replied, head still in the bonnet.

"I look after my possessions." Bond's tone was very serious and Q was sure that he wasn't talking about his material items. "Would you like some help?"

"That would be great actually." So they worked through their lunch making improvements to the DB9. Q found himself a little bit down when Bond stepped out of the lift on the second floor. Was he really starting to enjoy Bond's company that much that he missed it when the man was gone? No, he thought, he had just enjoyed working on the car.

Later that evening it also happened to be Q-Branch's Christmas party. It wasn't really much of anything, as at least half of the office had to stay sober in case of emergencies. The office space was opened up by moving some of the desks to the sides of the room and Christmas decorations had been put up (though Q had checked all the boxes and everyone's desks to make sure that there was no mistletoe). Other departments put up with bog standard CD players, though not Q-Branch; no, they had a huge sound system which was usually used to broadcast difficult missions to a number of workers but which was now attached to someone's iPad. One of the interns had managed to turn the bass down too.

Q chuckled to himself when Bond finally walked in an hour after the party had started; he looked very out of place in his tailored grey suit and metallic tie when everyone else had donned their cheesiest Christmas jumpers, jeans, and party hats. Bond sat down in the vacant chair next to Q and reached behind him to get a mini sausage roll from his plate of leftovers from the buffet.

"There's a whole table of food over there." Q nodded towards the buffet table where two of his 'plus size' employees stood.

"Waste not want not." Bond then leaned over taking a sniff out of the plastic cup in Q's hand which contained coke. "You're not drinking?"

"I offered to stay sober for this one. Perhaps next year?" he replied with a shrug.

"Perhaps it's best you left the drinking to the professionals."

"Q? 007?" Eve stood in front of them dressed in a black glittering knee-length dress, which even Q had to admit she looked stunning in. "M wants to see you both."

"Now? Can't it wait until tomorrow?" He glanced around at the party, hoping she would get the message that he didn't want to leave the party early and distance himself more from his employees. All the time off he was having to take wasn't good for the recently appointed, youngest ever Quartermaster in regards to his employees.

"Sorry, Q, it's urgent." He sighed and stood up, feeling Bond do the same beside him. Eve lent forward, placing a hand on Q's shoulder, winking as she said, "I'll keep an eye on things here."; good God, she was going to get them all plastered, wasn't she?

When they arrived at M's office they found the door open with the man sat behind his mahogany desk, frantically pouring over his paperwork. M doesn't look up from the desk when he tells them that he's trying to get through it all before Christmas, then he might be able to spend a few hours with his family. He doesn't look up until Bond tells him that they were told it was urgent.

"Ah, yes. We've received some information about the Hackney Hackers." Q rolls his eyes at the name that the hackers have dubbed themselves. It made them sound amateur when they were anything but; they are hard to pin down (apart from that they are operating from somewhere in Hackney) and Q had so far failed in disabling them remotely. "There is a cell operating from a cellar in Hackney that contains the group's main servers, there's a club next door with a connecting cellar. You are to gain access to the servers and destroy their systems and all their backup files; get a virus in there or something, just make sure you get it all. We don't know who these bastards are, so I want you to make it hard to set themselves back up, which will give us a chance to catch up with them before they do any serious damage."

"Q has to go? He doesn't do field work; he hasn't passed the assessments." Q hated his Alpha in that moment; he wasn't some child who needed his hand holding while crossing the road.

"He's the only person who's going to get pass their firewall; if he can't do it remotely then he'll have to go in himself. You'll be escorting him of course, Bond. If there happens to be anyone there, I want them brought in for questioning."

"I can go myself with an agent, no need to send a Double-Oh, M. I've guided enough operatives through sticky situations to know what to do." The petulant child had reared its ugly head again.

"That's not the same, Q. You haven't even fired a gun before!" The Alpha's voice had risen slightly in exasperation and Q noticed that even M leant back in his chair slightly.

"Of course I've fired a gun before. I'm the bloody Quartermaster! Half of what I do is deal with guns."

"Testing out a guns shooting range doesn't mean you're going to be able to shoot someone if you need to." Q stepped back at that. Bond was right; he knew how to shoot a target but he had never shot anyone.

M took advantage of Q's silence clearing his throat. "I want them disabled by midnight. Q, the blueprints for the street are in your inbox. Take Bond to armoury on your way to your office and have him choose your weapons; he's more than capable of doing than himself."

"Yes, Sir," Q muttered before storming out of the office, not bothering to see if Bond was following him.


	10. Chapter 10

Bond pulled the car over in a back alley a couple of streets away from the building they were meant to be entering. He reached under his seat and pulled out a black gun case that looked suspiciously small to Q.

"Please don't tell me you've brought a Taurus for me," Q said, even as he watched the Double-Oh take out the pocket pistol and load it for him. "I usually assign that particular gun to female agents who need something small to conceal within their dresses."

"It'll be easier for you to use if you need to." He paused for a moment before passing it over. "I know M said he wanted prisoners but I want you to promise me you won't hesitate to shoot."

Q rolled his eyes at the man. Of course he wouldn't hesitate if some mad man was running towards him with a gun. Obviously an eye roll wasn't the answer Bond was looking for, as he pulled the gun back out of Q's reach. "Promise. Me."

A command. "I promise." Bond was obviously pleased with that answer as he handed over the gun which Q quickly put in the holster strapped to his ankle. He checked the blueprints which he had stored on his phone for easy access. "Shall we?"

James cleared his throat and turned away from Q to get out of the car. It was always a little awkward after Bond had used the hold he had over Q to get what he wanted. Not that it happened often, though it had happened enough times to make Q realise how much power Bond had over him. Bond didn't head off in the direction of the street they needed but to the boot of the car, where he retrieved a black suit jacket which he handed to Q.

Q raised his eyebrows to which James responded to with, "Well, you don't think a high-end London club is going to let you in that cardigan, do you?'

"No, perhaps not." He swapped his comfy cardigan for the surprisingly well-fitted jacket. "It fits."

"That's because it's your size. I bought it a few weeks ago and I've been waiting for the moment I could trick you out of your cardi." James smirked at Q, which made it very hard not to be completely immature and stick his tongue out at the Alpha.

"Are you ready?" Q asked instead.

"Yes. Come on, stay behind me and for god's sake, keep your earpiece in." Q scoffed at that, remembering the many missions that Bond had 'misplaced' his earpiece during. Q followed Bond to the street they needed and stayed behind a wall while Bond scouted out the area.

James took his hand, pulling him out and towards the nightclub which was located in the centre of the busy street. "Come on."

"The hand-holding?"

"One of the bouncers is a Beta and there's a queue. If we walk in at his side, he's more likely to let us past as he won't want me to think he is thinking lowly on you." Bond was right. The bouncers unclipped the red rope to let them through as soon as they were close enough to smell for a Beta.

The club was crowded, loud, and smelled faintly of sweat. The sort of place that Q hated to be and had only frequented when it was truly unavoidable. James simply pulled him over to a booth and sat him down before gesturing that he was going to get drinks from the bar. Q took out his phone and began to load up the blueprints of the building.

"Where's the entrance to the cellar?" The Double-Oh's voice drifted into his ear through his ear piece.

"Give me a second." Q quickly worked out where Bond was located in the building in relation to the cellar entrance. "Ah."

"Ah?" Bond glanced over to try and gage the Quartermaster's expression.

"Behind the bar. There looks to be a storeroom; can you see it?" Bond made a humming noise, acknowledging that he could in fact see the door. "There seems to be a trap door leading to the cellar in there."

"Of course there is. No other entrances, I assume." Bond began to head back to their table with two drinks.

"Negative." A white wine was placed in front of him and he watched as Bond remained standing but downed his whisky.

"We need a distraction. Go when I tell you to and I'll meet you down there as soon as I can." A pained look passed 007's face. "Remember your promise."

With that, he turned and disappeared into the crowd. Q looked around for a better vantage point near to the bar; he spotted a pillar on the edge of the dance floor and only a couple of metres from the bar. He headed over to it, but before he made it, a scuffle broke out near the bar area at the opposite side to the store room. The staff behind the bar both turned towards it, as well as the bars other patrons, leaving a clear path to the storeroom.

"Q, go." Bond's slightly breathless voice instructed. Q took a deep breath and ran, placing his hands on the bar surface and jumping over. He dropped to the floor once he was over it, glanced up to make sure no one had noticed him, then dived through the open storeroom door, yanking the trap door open and taking the steps into the cellar two at a time. First, he checked that there was definitely no one around, and then he caught his breath. Adrenaline. It pumped though his veins, making his limbs shake; how did agents manage to finish their missions mostly intact with all this pumping through them.

"I'm in the cellar. How long?"

"Five minutes. Need to shake off these bouncers." The man's voice was quiet, but Q could hear a definite echo.

"Are you hiding in the toilet?"

"Yes. Just until the bouncers return to their posts and I can sneak into the cellar." Q listened while working out which way he had to go. It was actually quite complicated as this was an old London wine cellar. Plenty of twists, turns, pillars, and solid walls which kept the Thames at bay. He took out a small spray canister from his pants pocket and sprayed the bottom of his shoes. A simple liquid which contained a high concentration of chlorophyll, which meant his footsteps would glow blood red under a UV light. Luckily, one of the gadgets that Q had added to Bond's phone was a UV light.

"Follow my footprints using the UV light on your phone when you get down here," Q told Bond, heading off in the direction the blueprints where showing him.

"You are a clever boy, aren't you, Q?"

"I try."

There was nothing but silence for the rest of Q's walk through the maze of a cellar and he sighed in relief when he heard the familiar buzz of a server through a doorway straight in front of him. He took out his gun before going any further, holding it out in front of him, aiming as he entered the room. When he had assured himself that there was no one there, he put his arms to the side of him, racing toward a computer which was attached to a huge wall-to-floor server, which stretched across the whole five-metre wall. God, what ten of these things could do in the wrong hands. Q knew he needed to be thorough in wiping this computer, and any of the others he could gain access to.

"I'm at the server. No one here. I'm going to begin to take down the firewall." Bond didn't answer for a while but the music had gotten louder again, so Q assumed he must be back in the clubs main room.

"Stay alert."

"Of course."

As Q began to take down the firewall, he listened out to hear what was going on at Bond's end; he could hear that the man was finally in the cellar and on his way. It wasn't long until he heard approaching footsteps and it took Q only a couple of seconds to realise they were out of sync with the ones he could hear in his earpiece. He reached for the gun and flipped round in the chair but it was too late – the man had already spotted Q and had his finger on the trigger while he hadn't even aimed his gun yet.

Bang. Bang. Two shots echoed through the cellar.

He closed his eyes, expecting to feel the bite of bullets enter his chest, but it never came. When he opened his eyes he found the man in front of him clutching his chest with his mouth open slightly in shock. He fell to his knees before his head hit the ground with a painful crack. That's when Q saw James Bond. Gun still aimed and stony look on his face.

Their gazes locked over the dying man. "I didn't hesitate, he was just quicker."

"I know. Now finished the job before more of them turn up." Q turned back to the computer, frantically typing in the lines of code.

"Okay, I've just got to send this virus out to all the other computers attached to this one and then start to wipe the thing completely." He heard the unmistakable snap of a neck and knew that Bond had put the guy out of his misery. It surprised him that he didn't feel anything; it was just... business. "Are they using the club to enter this place?"

"No. The other entrances are blocked off but there is a large enough hall in the wall a couple of rooms back, which suggests they have been using the sewers to get in here," Bond told him, dragging the man's body to the other side of the room and laying it against the brick wall, checking the pockets. "No identification."

"It's so simple it's brilliant. There must be hundreds of unused cellars in London that can be accessed via the sewers. Not very good for the foundations, though." He entered the last line of code, moving back with a satisfied sigh as he watched the computer begin to wipe itsself. "Show me to this sewer, then."

A quick glance of a map and Q had them through the sewers and out of a manhole not 50 yards away from where their car was parked in no time. He dialled M's number as he climbed into the passenger seat.

"Mission accomplished?"

"Yes, sir. One fatality. No other suspects. Though we have learnt that they are using the sewers to gain access to disused cellars." Bond pulled out of the alley as Q reported the outcome of their mission to M while simultaneously composing an email on his iPad.

"The body?"

"Emailing a map and instructions of how to gain access to the body to the clean-up team as we speak."

"Very well. I'll see you both tomorrow at..." He paused, and Q imagined he was checking his diary to see when he could fit the pair of them in for a debrief. "11am."

"We'll see you then," Q confirmed before terminating the call. He looked at Bond, realising the man was frowning. "Thank you."

"What for?" James voice was gruff and sounded irritated.

"Shooting that man before he shot me." Q didn't think he really needed to clarify.

"I'd take a bullet for you; I am your Alpha and that's my job. You don't need to thank me for saving your life."

Q stayed quiet for the rest of their journey home. He didn't even complain when Bond climbed into bed with him smelling of whisky and cigarettes a couple of hours after Q himself had tried to get to sleep. And Q definitely didn't say anything when he felt the soft kiss that Bond placed on his forehead.


	11. Chapter 11

Life was normal for a few days after the mission. They attended the debriefing together and Q filed a report and Bond returned their guns to the armoury. To Q's relief, he also returned to his own bed.

He was working late on the Monday when Bond returned to Q-Branch for the fifth time. "Go home. I'll get a taxi when I'm finished."

"I don't believe you," Bond said, leaning in his office doorway watching Q typing frantically. "You know it's already past 11?"

"Two minutes past is hardly past 11, Bond." Q rolled his eyes at the man.

"It's Christmas Eve, Q."

"And tomorrow is Christmas Day, which the both of us have managed to be rota'd off for." He sighed. "Ten minutes, I promise. I just want to make sure that the security system is tip-top for tomorrow."

"Can I trust you to actually leave your office in ten minutes if I go and wait in the car?"

"I'll see you in ten," he said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

He made it down to the car at a quarter-to-midnight to find Bond dozing in the driver's seat. The man woke up when Q climbed into the passenger seat fixing him with bloodshot eyes.

"You were tired? Why didn't you say?" Q felt terribly guilty as at the end of the day, 007's job was a lot more physically demanding than his own.

"You'd just insist I go home without you. I prefer to wait," Bond told him as he put the car into gear and pulled out of their parking space.

"I could have got home on my own."

"There's no point in that when I'm here to take you."

Q agreed to disagree.

Q woke up to the smell of cooking bacon. He reached to the side for his glasses, checking the clock to realise it was only 0805. What was Bond doing up so early? He groaned as he climbed out of his bed, fastening his dressing gown whilst simultaneously opening his bedroom door.

"James, it's eight o'clock in the morning and we're on day off," he informed Bond as he rubbed sleep from his eyes, knocking his glasses off in the process, which of course his Alpha caught as he was just that amazing even at this time in the morning. God, the man infuriated him.

"Merry Christmas, Q. I made breakfast." Q just sort of stared at Bond as the man put his glasses back on his face for him.

"Is there something wrong with you?" He fell into the chair which Bond pulled out for him.

"No," the blonde answered while serving the bacon and eggs Benedict. What the hell was up with the man? Why was he trying so hard and acting so completely out of character? Then it hit him.

"Oh my god! You read my file!" He jumped from his seat and pointed a finger at Bond.

"What?"

"Don't even try your secret agent crap on me; I've listened in on enough of your missions to know exactly what you're doing," Q cried, taking another step back.

"Alright, I read your file, but don't even try and pretend you haven't read mine," Bond accused, pointing the spatula at Q.

"Bond, it's my job to read your file and before you say it, I didn't read anything I didn't need to know out of respect for you."

Bond was silent for a moment, and Q knew he was trying to decide whether he was telling the truth or not. "I'm sorry. In my defence, I read your file before any of this; I like to know I can trust my Quartermasters."

Q could accept that. Bond wasn't the most trusting person. "And all of this?"

"To help you forget."

Q nodded. "Alright. I accept."

"You accept?"

"Your explanation. Just don't expect me to be happy." As Q tucked into his breakfast, he couldn't help the little smile that curled the corner of his lips. This was possibly one of the nicest things anyone had ever done for him.

At around 10am there was a knock at the door. "Are you expecting someone?" he asked Bond. The man shook his head and went to look through the spy hole.

"It's one of your interns." And sure enough when Bond opened the door, Timothy, his newest intern stood there looking very awkward and out of place.

"What is it? Do you need me to come in to the office?" Q asked, moving in front of James.

"No, Sir, Miss Moneypenny sent me with a gift for you both." He heard Bond scoff at that as the young man reached to the side of the door and carefully passed a large round box over to Q and then another one to Bond. When Q looked up to thank Timothy, the boy had already gone.

Then the box moved.

"Please tell me she hasn't," Bond pleaded, pulling out a packet of kitten food from his own box. Q placed his box on the floor and pulled off the top to find a small, brown, and extremely fluffy kitten.

"She has." Q reached into the box and picked up the kitten to show to Bond, who paled a little when he saw the animal. He noticed a note at the bottom of the box. "'Dear 007 & Q. Merry Christmas. Have fun. Eve.' What does she think she's playing at; I don't want a cat!"

"We'll take it back to her tomorrow," Bond told him with a sense of finality, but as he said it the little kitten, sensing that he clearly wasn't loveable enough, snuggled into Q's chest and he knew there was only a slim chance he wasn't going to keep it.


	12. Chapter 12

By noon on Boxing Day, Q was very much in love with the kitten. He had a feeling Bond was quite taken with him (a quick Google search helped Q define the sex) too, having caught him feeding the mite the kitten milk that had come in the box when he thought Q was still in the shower.

At the moment, Bond was at MI6 being briefed about some new information regarding an intel mission he was due to leave for in a couple of days. Q should be catching up on some work himself but he found himself unable to stop playing with the kitten when it demanded his attention; which was most of the time.

"Shall we take this fellow back to Moneypenny, then? I'm sure she'll find a new home for him." Q jumped and whipped his head up to look at Bond, who stood in the doorway.

"You scared me," Q whispered accusingly.

"I do apologise." That didn't sound like much of an apology to Q. "So the kitten? Shall I get his stuff together?" Bond gestured to the numerous toys that had been scattered around the living area. Q couldn't help but pout a little.

"Q?"

"Yes, James?"

"Keep the bloody kitten." He frowned a little. "You obviously want to. I'm not going to make you give it away."

"You don't mind me keeping him?" Q asked, trying to gage Bond's reaction.

"Of course not. Whatever keeps you off that laptop for any length of time can only be a good thing." He couldn't help but laugh a little.

"Alright, then I suppose I better think of a name for you," he told the kitten, who happily pounced on Bond's expensive leather shoes as he walked by. A pained look passed over the man's face as he looked down to see the sharp claws deeply embedded in his shoe.

"How about 'Crockett'?" Bond suggested, while prizing the kitten off his foot.

"Crockett?" Q asked, puzzled.

"Well, these are my best pair of Crockett & Jones shoes, and he does seem to have taken a liking to them," he told him while passing the kitten back over to Q.

"Crockett Jones. That has a nice ring to it." He lifted the kitten up so he could look him in the eye. "Hello, Crockett."  
He looked up to find Bond smiling at him. "What?"

"Just you with the kitten. It's nice," he said with a shrug, walking into the kitchen and putting the kettle on. "Tea?"

"Please."

New Years Eve and Q was working; well he finished at 5pm. Bond had been away on his mission for three days now. It was lunch time and he was about to go and bother Eve, as he hadn't seen her since before Christmas, when his phone rang.

"Q," he answered.

"It's me." James' voice drifted down the phone.

"James? What's wrong? I thought I'd texted you?" Q said thinking back to this morning and trying to remember whether he really had texted the Alpha to let him know he had got to work alright.

"You did. I just rang to see if everything was fine at HQ. You know what intel gathering's like; hardly anyone contacts you." Well, that was a bit of a lie, as Q had overheard Bond's handler on the phone with the agent not more than an hour ago.

"Everything's fine. We're all plodding along as usual."

"And you're okay?" Q heard a hint of uncertainty in the tone.

"I'm fine. Crockett's keeping me up at night still, but I think once he gets in a bit of a routine he'll grow out of it." Bond hummed in agreement. "How's the mission?"

"Boring. I don't think this is the guy we want, to be honest. All he does is sleep and watch TV." Q knew from experience that Double-ohs hated intel missions.

"Perhaps he'll go out tonight, so then at least you can spend New Year's out in Paris." Always look on the bright side, eh, Q?

"I doubt that. He hasn't left the flat since I got here. I swear I'll be having a good talk with whoever said this guy was dangerous."

"Bond, I know you know damn well that someone can do as much damage from their living room as they can in Buckingham Palace," Q admonished while hacking into Bond's handler's PC and bringing up the file on the suspect. Suspected terrorist using home PC to gain supporters and plot against the British Government.

"He hasn't even used his PC for anything but porn in three days. Surely a terrorist attack takes more organising that this?" Bond questioned, a tone of frustration entering his voice.

"I'm sure they'll pull you out soon if he doesn't do anything. I take it you haven't been able to bug his flat, then?" Q knew he hadn't; he was reading the mission report.

"No. If he gets drunk tonight I'm going to do it then."

"Good." If Bond managed to bug the flat, MI6 would bring him home; a few cameras and mics were harder to discover that a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Double-oh.

"Go to lunch, Q."

"Well, I'd have gone a lot sooner if someone wasn't holding me up."

"Goodbye, Q." And then Bond hung up, leaving Q with a small smile on his face.

Q spotted the broadly smiling Moneypenny almost immediately on entering the canteen. He helped himself to a jacket potato and beans and went to join her at the table she had obviously intended for them to sit at together.

"So, how was your Christmas, Q?" Her smile turned into a smirk.

"It was okay. I have to talk to you about the cat, though."

"Don't bother. James already told me how much you love the little guy."

"Well, yes I suppose that's true, but why a cat?"

"You work too much. You both do, really. A cat will get you home more and distract you while you're there. A job isn't everything, Q. Besides, my cat had a litter and I was struggling to find a home for that one."

"So you thought, 'Q's a bit of a soft touch I'll bet he'll take in the runt of the litter'." That was a bit harsh; Crockett wasn't a runt.

"I'd had you in mind for one for a few weeks. You look like a cat person." She gave him the once over while he repeated; "A cat person?" under his breath.

"Bond says you're not on your laptop as much."

"Yes, well, Bond should learn to keep his mouth shut."

"Have you named him?"

"James has, actually. Crockett."

"James named him? Well, that is a turn-up for the books. What you doing tonight?" It was hard to keep up with Eve's train of thought.

"Playing computer games, probably." He shrugged; what else would one do?

"On New Year's Eve?" One of her eyebrows was up.

"On New Year's Eve, yes."

"Come out to an Omega club with me. Get drunk for once." Was she asking MI6's Quartermaster out for New Year's? Q thought she might have been... Was this pity?

"I shouldn't."

"Of course you should. I'll text James myself to tell him you'll be with me."

"Eve..."

"Q. Don't argue."

"What about your Alpha?" Moneypenny had mentioned that she did in fact have an Alpha, but she never much talked about him and she didn't seem restricted by him in anyway.

"He's away. And while he's out of town I hit the Omega clubs."

"I'm not sure..." Q hated clubs. He really did.

"Have you ever been to a club before?" Her eyebrows raised up a little.

"Of course. I did have a life before MI6." Why did people always assume he was a bit of a recluse?

"But have you ever been to an Omega club before?" She has him there. Omega clubs where ones that catered to mated Omegas. Well, they were the only sort of club that Omegas were generally allowed to go without their Alphas. They were run, staffed, and attended to by only bonded Omegas. "I'm taking your silence as a no. How do you know you won't like it?"

"I don't, I suppose." Q rolled his eyes.

"So you'll come, then?"

"I don't have a choice, do I?"

"No, you don't. I'll pick you up in a taxi at 8pm." She winked at him, picked up her tray, and left him to contemplate what the hell he was going to wear.  
It was less than an hour before he received a text from Bond.

Moneypenny's told me she's taking you out. J  
31/12/12 13.21pm

Yes. She's forcing me. Q  
31/12/12 13.27pm

She promised to look after you. J  
31/12/12 13.35pm

It's an Omega club. Q  
31/12/12 13.42pm

I know. I want you to keep in contact with me still.  
Even if it is an Omega club. J  
31/12/12 13.46pm

Of course. Q  
31/12/12 13.57pm

Every hour. Have fun. J  
31/12/12 14.03pm

If that's what you want. Q  
31/12/12 14.13pm

"You look fab." He had gone for the suit jacket Bond had given him with a dark green shirt and black pants. "Bond get you that?"

"Perhaps." He didn't miss Moneypenny's smirk.

The club was only a ten minute taxi journey from his flat. They clambered out of the cab (Q helping Moneypenny out of the cab gracefully) and walked straight through the doors of the club. The club was actually nice. The dance floor didn't look too crowded, the wait at the bar was short, and the music wasn't so loud that you couldn't think.

"Not as bad as you thought?" Eve asked him, with a satisfied look on her face. Q just rolled his eyes.

It wasn't more than five minutes before they where sat down at a table with drinks. "You've texted Bond, right?"

"Yes. He'd told me to have fun but text him every hour; he hasn't asked you to text him every hour too, has he?" Q had the urge to roll his eyes again but he was pretty sure he had done it enough for one day.

"No, he hasn't. I'll remind you to text him, though. I don't want to get on the wrong side of Bond's Alpha." Q laughed at that mental picture.

"He can be pretty scary, can't he?" He thought back to all the times Bond had almost lost control because of him.

"He's a good Alpha, you know; you're very lucky." Q just took a sip of his drink. "He'll make a good father."

That made him spit his drink out. "God, no! We don't want that. We made an agreement. Has he said something to you?" It must be comical how wide his eyes are, he thought.

"No, he hasn't; don't worry." She sighed, swilling her wine in the glass before taking a gulp. "You shouldn't be so quick to dismiss the idea of kids though. I thought I didn't want any, I thought it was the worst thing in the world, and then I got pregnant." She gave him a sad smile before glancing to the dance floor and then continuing. "Eight years ago. Before MI6. I'm sure you've read my file and you know I was with the police. Jonathan and I mated when I was just 22, he's 10 years older, I was investigating a burglary at his house and we just clicked. We dated for a couple of months before my heat came around, but by then I knew he was the one so I let him mate with me. He's a business consultant so he works away a lot, but that's never bothered me. Children seemed like the worst idea in the world to me, and Jonathan wanted to concentrate on his career, so we were careful."

took a bigger gulp of her wine. "Not careful enough though, as two years later I was pregnant. It took me the whole of two seconds to realise that I was being silly and I wanted a child. Then I got shot. Routine patrol gone wrong. I lost the baby and the ability to have children that day." She finished her story and Q reached over to take hold of her hand.

"I'm sorry," Q told her sincerely.  
"There's nothing to be sorry about. It happened. I'm happy now." She smiled a wicked smile at him. "Now, let's get drunk."

Q stumbled into his flat past 3am. Closing the door and locking it, he reached into his pocket to grab his phone to text James.

"Don't bother. I know you got home safe,"

Q jumped around, hand on his chest to calm himself. "James!"

"Q," he said in greeting, and offered up a second tumbler with what looked like whiskey in. "Care to salute the New Year with me?"

"I thought you were in Paris?" he asked, confused even as he accepted the tumbler from the man.

"I was. Suspect's dead."

"What!?" Not another one.

"Nothing to do with me," he said, holding his hands up in surrender. "Heart attack, I think. I thought he was sleeping so I went over there to bug the flat, and that's when I realised he was dead."

"What did you do?"

"Took his computer and took the jet back to London; landed an hour ago. The computer's waiting for you in your office." Just then Crockett trotted happily out of Q's bedroom meowing.

"Hello, Crockett." Q reached down to pet him, though Crockett was easily distracted by one of the toys lying on the floor at the other side of the room.

"I fed him when I got in," Bond told him.

"You did?"

"He looked hungry," he said with a shrug.

"He's always hung-..." Q stopped when an overwhelming feeling of sickness came over him. Bond took the tumbler that Q thrust in his direction with a questioning look and watched as the man ran to the kitchen sink to vomit.

It wasn't long before he felt fingers combing through his hair and hushing noises being made in his ear to try to calm his panicked breathing. When he finally seemed to have stopped, Q leaned back into Bond's chest as the man got him a glass of water and swilled out the sink; all with one hand.

"You alright?" he asked, pulling Q more securely into his chest.

"I think I'd like to go to bed now," Q told him, and let himself be guided into his bedroom and tucked into bed after his jacket shoes and socks had been taken off.

"I'll stay in here tonight and make sure you don't choke on your own vomit," Bond told him, leaving no room for argument.

"Alright." Q was ashamed by how pathetic and weepy he sounded, and so decided to just close his eyes and wait for the world to stop spinning.


	13. Chapter 13

"Here," Q half-heard in his semi-conscious state, along with a terribly load scraping noise and the screech of his curtains being pulled open. Then he saw the sunlight, lots of it, making him see red through his closed eyelids. That was painful. "It's almost 10am, Q. Surely you haven't managed to wrangle both Christmas and New Year's off, have you? Management must be nice."

"I'm working from home. Close the fucking curtains and leave me alone for another two hours at least, would you?" The last thing he wanted to think about was the shit-load of paperwork he had to complete before he went back to the office tomorrow. Q felt Crockett jump on the bed before trotting over and nonchalantly sitting on his head; Bond's chuckle was never more annoying than at that moment.

"I brought you Starbucks." Ah, yes, that's what the smell was. Good God, his brain was addled this morning. Thankfully though, he heard Bond walk over and take the kitten off his head while he was trying to process whether the Starbucks was worth the pain of sitting up. It wasn't.

"I'll microwave it later." He burrowed further under the duvet, hoping the Alpha would take the fucking hint.

"It's Gingerbread Latte." Q heard rather than saw the man fold his arms.

"In that case, perhaps I will have it now." He reached for the cup, trying to drink it whilst still lying horizontal with his eyes closed. He was actually doing quite well... until he remembered the previous night. He choked down another sip, feeling his face heat up in embarrassment. "I vomited."

"You did," the blond confirmed.

"I vomited from alcohol," Q repeated.

"It seems that way, yes."

"That's never happened to me before." He never lost control like that. Ever.

"Welcome to your teens." Bond smirked at him. Fucking Alphas.

"I feel awful. Why do people do this every weekend?" He snuggled back down into the bed, pulling the covers up over his nose. He watched as Bond leant against his doorframe.

"It's called having fun. You should try it more." The smirk was still firmly in place and Q was glad he'd pulled the covers right up, as he was pretty sure he was pouting. "Q, go and have a bath. You'll feel better, I promise."

Q did just that and he did feel much better. Instead of getting dressed, he put on his comfiest pyjamas, though he found that his duvet had disappeared when he reappeared from his bathroom. He headed towards the living area and was about to shout at Bond for tricking him to the bath and then taking his bedding when he noticed the duvet on his sofa and the man stood by the oven. Bond looked up from whatever he was cooking and nodded towards the sofa, so Q went and sat down, pulling the covers over himself. He looked back over to James, who was carrying two plates over. He placed one in Q's lap before sitting down next to Q with his own. On the plate were sausage, bacon, eggs, hash brown, beans, and black pudding.

"A fry-up?"

"Well, it's an oven-cooked fry up. The grease will probably make you feel worse." Bond turned the news on and tucked into his own breakfast and Q followed suit. After they were finished, the agent took their plates to be washed and brought over Q's laptop. "You have work to do, right?"

"Plenty." This was possibly the first time that Q really hadn't wanted to work.

"Alright. Well, I'll make you a cup of tea and leave you to it. Though be warned, Q, I'm only being nice as this is your first hangover." Bond's smile was quite wide then and Q thought he might just resemble a shark.

Q was happy to wake up the next morning to find his head much clearer than it had been the day before, which was good news as there was a French computer that needed analysing. He dressed quickly and ran the brush through his hair a couple of times before brewing himself some Earl Grey and sitting down at the kitchen table with a bowl of Coco Pops. There was some morning chat show on the TV when Q switched it on but he didn't bother turning it over. If he was honest, he was getting pretty sick of the news. The presenters, an Alpha and Omega mated pair, were talking to a Beta man who had fallen in love with an Omega; but their relationship had been disallowed by the Omega's parents and she'd been quickly mated to an Alpha. The Beta argued that people should not be defined by their status but allowed to be with who they wanted to be. The Alpha presenter chipped in by asking the man how he, 'expected to satisfy an Omega in heat', the man held his own and stated that if an unmated Omega could go through a heat on their own then surely they could manage with the help of a Beta. The Omega presenter agreed with that but was quickly cut off by her Alpha mate and just as things were getting interesting, Bond walked in from his morning jog.

"What's this tripe?" he asked while turning the TV over to BBC News. Q rolled his eyes and took his now empty dish over to the sink. "That's okay. I wasn't watching it or anything."

Bond turned an incredulous stare on him. "That?"

"Yes, perhaps I'm interested in what happens in our society." He drained his mug and placed that in the sink too. "I'm going to work."

"Just let me grab the keys," Bond said, heading towards his jacket which was flung on the back of the sofa.

"No. I'm going to work. You've got a day off, so you are staying here." Bond's mouth opened as if to argue. "Feed Crockett. He's still asleep."

Q almost got to the door before Bond managed to formulate a sentence. "Are you rebelling?" That stopped Q. To rebel against one's Alpha was... well it was quite a serious accusation.

"James, I'm not rebelling, really. I just want a little of my independence back. I can get myself to work; I do it when you're not around, don't I?" Q placed his hand on the door handle but waited for the man's response.

"You'll text when you get to work." It wasn't a request.

"I always do; I wouldn't disobey you." Bond seemed to like that answer. "So I'll just be off, then?"

"Take a taxi."

"What?" The door was halfway open but he was still facing the blond.

"You'll be late if you take the Tube." He glanced at the clock; so he would. "I have a tenner here; don't let them rip you off."

He didn't take the money the man was offering him. "I have my own money."

"I know, but that would mean stopping at a cash machine which you really don't have time for." Q took the ten pound note.

"Thank you." With a final nod, Q finally left the flat. It would have been easier just to let Bond drive him.

It was past three and Q hadn't even taken his lunch break yet. The computer was proving difficult to crack. He wasn't even a little bit surprised to see 007 marching through Q-Branch in a grey suit.

"007," he greeted professionally, when the man opened his office door.

"M wants to see us." Bond didn't come into his office but stepped to the side, expecting Q to leave through it.

"Just what I need," he muttered, storming past Bond.

"Q, anything from the computer?" the man asked before they had even been able to take a seat.

"Looks like they used a proxy."

M was silent for a while as he digested the information. "Are you saying that sending 007 to Paris was a waste of time?"

Q watched as M's cheeks reddened in anger slightly. "Not completely. We got the computer and in a couple of hours I should have traced the location of the source."

"Alright. Bond, I want you on stand-by to head to whatever location Q gives you." Bond nodded. Satisfied with his agent, M turned to face his Quartermaster.

"Q, I trust I can leave you in charge of this?"

"Sir," he said with a nod, standing along with Bond. "I'll inform you when I have a location."

"Oh, and Bond." James turned back to face M from the doorway. "I suggest you spend the time waiting in the gym and away from Q-Branch; I want Q's full attention on the task at hand."

Q blushed, feeling the need to tell M that he would have his full attention on the aforementioned task and not be distracted by Bond, but when he opened his mouth to tell him that, his Alpha gave him a sharp look and pushed him out the door with a quick "Yes, Sir."

Two hours later and he had narrowed the source down to a PC in a block of flats in Glasgow. He sent one of the interns to collect Bond for the mission briefing and busied himself collecting the equipment the agent was going to need before he put a video call through to M. M answered just as Bond entered his office looking freshly showered.

"You have the location?" M asked, getting straight down to business. The pair looked up at the big screen which was located on Q's back wall.

"Yes, Sir, Glasgow. Housing block. There may be civilians on site."

M glanced at something on his desk for a moment before looking back at them. "Proceed."

"I've chartered a jet to Glasgow. It leaves in forty-five minutes. I could brief Bond in the car on the way to the air field and then..."

"No, you'll go to Glasgow with Bond and once he's secured the building, I want you to get what you need from that computer. I want to close this file tonight."

"M. I don't fly." He couldn't get on a plane, not after... No, it just wasn't happening.

"I need you there, Q. You're getting on that plane. That's an order." Shit. Q gave a Bond a pleading look but the man shook his head and turned away.

"I'm sorry, Q, I can't." If Bond wasn't going to overrule M's order, he was fucked.

"I don't want to hear from you until the jobs done." With that, the screen went black. The pair continued the stare at it for a moment before Q let out a half sob.

"James, I can't do it." The blonde hushed him, placing a hand on the back of his neck and pulling him into his chest. It was a typical calming technique Alphas used on their Omegas; one that Bond hadn't used on Q before. He was surprised at how much better he felt because of the gesture. After a couple of minutes, the man released him, gently telling him to gather the equipment that they would need.

They saw Eve on the way out and she expressed her concern for Q's grey complexion but Bond didn't explain, merely pushed his flat key into her hand and asked her to feed Crockett on her way home.

On their way to the air field, Q had tried to brief Bond on the mission but had failed quite miserably. Bond told him they could worry about the details later. He was a quivering mess when they drove up to the private jet. Bond stopped the car and switched off the engine.

"Alright. Here's what's going to happen. I'm going to grab our equipment and put it on the plane, then I'm going to come back for you and we'll get on the plane together. Okay?"

No, he most certainly was not okay! He had a terrible case of the shakes. He watched Bond leave the car with the equipment and enter the jet. He wasn't inside more than a minute before he was heading back towards the park car opening the passenger door and crouching down beside Q, who continued to stare at the aircraft.

"Q," Bond sighed, pulling his left hand towards him, which had been gripping his thigh. He continued to look straight ahead until he felt a sharp nip on the back of his hand. "I'm sorry," Bond whispered as the Omega turned wide eyes on him.

"Don't take me on there, please," but even as he was saying it, his body was going limp and he was being pulled into the Double-oh's arms. "James... Ple... Please..." Then the world went black.

He vaguely remembered being carried down some steps and looking up at the falling snow. Snow hadn't been forecast in London, had it? He was in a car now; had he fallen asleep at work? Had Bond carried him from his desk to the car?

"Welcome back." He recognised Bond's voice as he opened his eyes. They were driving down a main road that certainly didn't look like London.

"Where," he coughed a little to try and clear his dry throat, "are we?"

"Here, take small sips of this," the blond told him, passing him a bottle of water which Q took gratefully. "We're in Glasgow."  
Glasgow? Why the hell were they in Glasgow? Then it came back to him. The source's location, M demanding he go with Bond, and a plane. "You drugged me!"

"Sorry, but I needed you not to be an emotional wreck on this mission. I know that you probably want to hit me right now for betraying you like that, but please, I need you to pull yourself together as we're about ten minutes from the address you gave me." Pull himself together; he'd just been drugged and put on a plane which had flown them to bloody Scotland. He took a deep breath to try and calm himself.

"How long was I out?" he asked, pulling his laptop from the back seat.

"About an hour-and-a-half. Are you feeling okay?" Bond had the decency to look concerned. Q didn't answer him but did send a glare his way. He opened up a satellite video connection and located their car, then panned out to the flat to see if he could find anything that would help Bond.

"I take it that you've equipped your gun and ear piece?" The man nodded to confirm that he had. "Alright. Well it looks as though you're in luck. There's work being done on the building so there's scaffolding up; I think you could get to the flat that way. It's on the fifth floor."

"I'll secure the flat then come back down for you."

"No, secure the flat, but then I'll come up on my own." Q grabbed the gun that he had brought for himself, putting it in the front pocket of his laptop bag, ready for when the coast was clear.

"Up the scaffold?" Bond gave him an incredulous look.

"Of course not. I'm going to get the code for the front door of the block and walk up the stairs, or I might even take the lift." Q flicked through the blueprints that he'd just downloaded from the local council's server.

"And where are you going to get the code for the front door from?" Bond asked as Q turned the red light ahead of them green.

"You'd be surprised what you can find on Google." Q replied distractedly. "And no, you're still going up the scaffolding. There's a choice of two windows to enter through. One looks as though it leads into the main bedroom, the other the bathroom. I'd suggest you go through the bathroom window as that leads straight into the living room and if there's anyone there, it's more likely they'll be in the living room at this time."

"Got it," he said pulling into a parking space across from building. "Don't move from this car until I tell you." With that, 007 left the car, switching on his earpiece as he ran towards the scaffolding. Q could see from the car the silhouette of someone moving around in the fifth floor flat; he just hoped that they weren't armed.


	14. Chapter 14

"I'm nearing the floor."

"I see you." Q watched Bond use pure upper-body strength to haul himself onto the scaffold on the 5th floor. "Bathroom window's on the left-hand side. Quiet as you can. Whoever's in there is in the bedroom next door."

"They have their music on very loud. I'll doubt they'll notice if I used their toilet," Bond quipped, and sure enough, Q could hear the heavy metal playing in the background; bit of a stereotype.

"How charming, 007," Q replied with an eye-roll, glancing down at his screen to get the pass code for the front door. "You in yet?"

"Almost," Bond whispered back. He glanced up in time to see the man disappear through the window.

"I'm coming up. Let me know when it's clear to approach the flat," Q told Bond as he closed up his laptop. He jumped out of the car and headed across the road. He could still hear the heavy metal playing through his earpiece as he punched in the code, slipping through the front door with ease and heading towards where the blueprints indicated the stairs were. The music went dead as he reached the second floor; he stopped walking so as to listen to what was happening inside the flat.

"Come out. I know you're there," a woman called out to Bond. Fuck.

"Is she the only target?" Q asked quietly, continuing his journey upstairs when he noticed a couple heading towards the stairwell.

Tap.

One tap meant 'yes', two for 'no', and three for 'don't know'. He almost sighed in relief; 007 could take one person.

"Armed?"

Tap. Tap. Tap.

"Find out," Q demanded harshly, just as the woman called out again. It was quiet on the other end and all Q could hear were two pairs of feet. The woman's moving frantically round the flat and Bond's quieter, more practised footsteps.

Tap. Armed. God damn it.

"Try talking her down first. Then engage if she doesn't cooperate." M wanted someone questioned and body bags couldn't talk.

"Put the gun down. No one needs to get hurt we just want to talk." Bond's voice was firm yet had a soft edge.

"I'll keep hold of it, but thanks for the offer." Not as easy as all that, then? "What organisation are you from?"

Bond didn't say anything and it took a couple of seconds for Q to realise he was waiting for permission to tell her. "Go ahead."

"MI6." That was followed by a hollow laugh from the woman, which made Q frown and quicken his steps - he was only just reaching the fourth floor.

"He told me you might come. He also told me what to do if you did."

"What did he tell you to do?"

"This." The gunshot rang out loud and clear through the earpiece, soon followed by an explosion that made the stairwell shudder and Q's knees give way. His hands hit the cool stone floor as he released a harsh breath and for a moment there was a deadly silence, only for a moment, before chaos descended on MI6's Quartermaster.

The fire alarm sounded – a shrill ringing – just before the other residents began exiting their respective flats. Women were screaming, children crying, and men shouting, but all Q could hear was the static in his earpiece. He knew Bond was alive as their bond was still intact, though that didn't mean the man wasn't gravely injured. He was starting to get jostled by people running past him so he climbed to his feet and ran up the last few steps before entering the fifth-floor corridor. He could see the door to the flat, and unfortunately for Q, there was no Double-oh making a quick exit. He pulled off his earpiece, pocketing it knowing that it was useless now. Q fished out his phone, at the same time speed dialling Tanner, who picked up on the second ring.

"There's been an explosion," Q told him before the man had even said anything. There was silence for a few seconds before the man answered. "Yes. It's been reported. Emergency services are on their way."

"Bond's still in there." He took a step in the direction of the apartment.

"Get yourself out of there, Q. Wait for the fire crews." Q could hear the man patching the call through to M's office.

"I'm nearly at the door." He was only about a meter away now. No point turning around when he had already come this far, was there?

"Q. 007 can look after himself. There maybe someone else in there with him and you are not trained to engage an enemy."

"I have to." Q was reaching for the door handle now, with his cardigan sleeve pulled over his hand encase the metal was hot.

"What's happening?" M's voice demanded. Q terminated the phone call, not wanting M to order him to stop.

He took a deep breath and pushed the door handle down. He took in the devastation in the flat; he could see straight through into the living room from his vantage point in the doorway. The woman was lying on the floor, clearly dead; next to her were the remains of a computer. He moved into the flat, noticing that smoke was beginning to gather on the living room ceiling as furnishing caught fire. Q headed straight for the bathroom, which was the first door on the left, and slipped into it. Bond lay on the floor, clearly having been knocked out from the blast but otherwise looked unharmed. He sunk to his knees beside the man and began shaking him to try and wake him. The blue eyes soon snapped open, alert and taking in his surroundings.

"What the hell are you doing here?" the agent asked, jumping to his feet, aiming his gun dead ahead.

"Rescuing you." He'd never felt relief like it to see the man on his feet ready for battle again.

"We're getting out of here. Suspect's dead." James grabbed his forearm and started dragging him towards the bathroom door when Q caught a whiff of something through the smoke fumes.

"There's a child here."

"A what!?" the blond almost shouted, giving Q an incredulous look.

"A child - I can smell them, the bedroom most likely," Q reasoned.

"I can't smell anything."

"Of course not. You're an Alpha. Get the child, Bond." The man just nodded, hauling Q out of the bathroom and giving him a push towards the door.

"Go. Wait for me at the stairs." And with that Bond moved further into the flat. Q wanted to go with him, but that was most definitely an order. He followed the instructions, running out of the flat and back to the stairs. He got there just in time to see Bond exit the flat, carrying a bundled up baby that looked no older than 18 months.  
Once the man reached him, he passed the baby over to Q who automatically rested him against his hip, silently looking for injuries.

"He seems to be fine. Though I did find crushed-up sleeping pills next to his bottles, which explains why the explosion didn't wake him." Bond the gently pushed him into the stairwell. "Come on. We need to contact M."

Q walked as quickly as he could down the stairs with the added weight of the baby. Bond stayed behind him the whole way, only sheathing his gun when they exited the building. The fire crew were just arriving as their faces were chilled by the cold night air. Q took in the area as any good MI6 worker should; the street was full of people crying and trying to call their loved ones.

"We'll stand across the street." Bond told him, nodding across the road. Once they got there, Bond sat him down, and Q pulled the sleeping baby to sit in his lap before pulling out his phone. The agent remained standing, clearly watching the area for suspicious activity. He had five missed calls on his phone, two from Tanner and three from M - as if on cue, his phone buzzed again; M.

"Q," he answered, trying to keep his voice low, not that anyone else would notice them in all this activity.

"What the bloody hell is happening?" M was angry.

"We're out. There was an explosion in the flat," Q told him.

"Fatalities."

"The suspect, a woman."

"How can a simple mission like this go so bloody wrong." M's voice rose to a shout at the end of the sentence, making Q hold the phone slightly away from his ear.

"They were waiting for MI6. They planned the explosion for if they were ever found."

"They? I thought there was only a woman?"

"She spoke of a man telling her what she should do if we happened to turn up. Listen to the recordings; they should have transmitted to the mission file by now." Fingers crossed if the earpiece hadn't been too damaged, but Q was confident in his equipment's fail-safes.

"Alright. We'll have a team sent out to retrieve the body and anything else in that flat once the situation is under control." M sounded calmer now.

"M. There's something else." M just grunted and Q took that as a sign that he should continue. "There was a child... _Is a child_. We took him from the flat."

"Is he injured?" M asked after a brief pause, probably to digest the information.

"No, he's asleep. Bond found crushed-up sleeping pills next to his bottles." Not sure if that was important for M to know, but told him anyway.

"Drugged?" His voice had gone dangerously quiet and Q could practically hear the profanities that M was calling the baby's parents. "The suspect's child?"

"Most likely, yes."

"Excellent." Q frowned. The child had just lost its mother - there was nothing excellent about it. "Alright. Here's what I want you to do. Book into a hotel and I'll send a medical team to your room to check you all over. Tomorrow we should have the body and possessions and you and Bond can bring the child down with the clean-up team... I suppose you could travel in a car because I'm not sure Bond can cope with your fear of flying and a child. Find out all you can from your hotel room but I have a hunch that that child is the man's that the woman spoke of. Perhaps we can lure him out of the woodwork."

"Okay."

"E-mail me the hotel details and anything you happen to discover. I'll see you at some point tomorrow." With that, M terminated the call, and Q looked up at Bond who was clearly waiting for their next orders.

"We need to find a hotel, then M's sending a medical team." He didn't need to add that there was more as James would know that already and know that this wasn't the place to talk about it.

"There's a Hilton not far from here," Bond told him, as he helped Q to his feet while trying not to jostle the child. They exited the scene where the police had arrived and were trying to get all the inhabitants' details. Luckily, no one saw them. When they arrived at the hotel, Bond went inside to book them a room before coming back out and escorting Q and the baby up to a family room. Apparently, the Hilton didn't supply baby cots but what they had done was place a single mattress on the floor between two double beds with a thin yellow sheet on. Q immediately lay the baby down on it so he could sleep more comfortably, and also to free his hands up to e-mail M.

"What did you tell the hotel?" Q asked.

"What do you mean?" Bond asked, while peeling his suit jacket off and sitting on the bed nearest the door.

"Well, surely they thought it was strange for us to be booking into a room with a baby and no luggage?" Q bent down and took a quick peek at the label inside the baby's top so he could request that the medical team bring supplies with them.

"Hotels like this don't ask questions... Well, Beta receptionists don't question Alphas anyway." He lay back on the bed and gave a tired sigh. "ETA on the medical team."

"Erm..." Q stalled while opening up the reply email. "Thirty to forty-five minutes."

"I wonder if we ordered Chinese, which would be quicker," the blond mused, getting up from the bed and heading to the bathroom.

"You're weird sometimes, 007," Q told him with a frown, while starting the process of securing the body and flat's possessions and organising for them to be collected by the clean-up team during the night.

"I'm going to have a shower. Order some Room Service, will you." With that, the bathroom door clicked shut, and Q was left alone with the sleeping child.


	15. Chapter 15

"He'll be fine," the kind red-headed medical officer told Q as she passed the now awake baby back to him. "I'm much happier now he's awake. What sort of parents...' She trailed off, giving Q a grim smile. The sort of parents that MI6 sent a Double-oh after, of course.

Q juggled the baby uncomfortably, hyperaware of the red-head's eyes on him, judging his ineptness with children. She gave him a reassuring smile. "You'll need to keep a close eye on him tonight and tomorrow. If he starts having any respiratory problems, call us immediately. I haven't seen any signs of smoke inhalation but you just never know. Better to be safe than sorry."

"When you say respiratory..." He sat down on the bed, jiggling the child slightly when he fussed.

"Wheezing, coughing, anything apart from breathing. Breathing's quite normal for a baby," she teased, as she pulled over a black gym bag. "Everything you're going to need is in here. Nappies, bottles, baby food, clothes, dummies - he may not use them, but if he does, it might make things easier - oh, and I've picked up a couple of toys to help you keep him occupied." Q nodded obediently.

"Don't look so worried; I'm sure Bond will help you." She turned towards the blonde, who was sitting by the window, having a cut on the back of his head stitched. "Won't you, 007."

"I can't. I've got a concussion." Though he sent a smirk in Q's direction, which Q took to mean that he would help.

"I'm sure you'll figure it out between you." The medic patted Q's arm with what could only be empathy. "He'll be a little fussy, that's nothing you're doing wrong, he just doesn't recognise your scents. It will help with you being a mated Omega though; a mated Omega's scent has a certain calming quality on youngsters."

Q noticed that the other medic had finished with Bond. The agent stood up from his chair, clearly shepherding the medics out. "Q will do what he does best." The two medics and Q waited to hear what that might be. "He'll Google it. Good evening." The red-head medic gave him one last reassuring smile before Bond shut the door in their faces.

"That was rude."

"Yes, well, I'd like to get some sleep tonight." He gathered up the medical supplies that had just been used to stitch him up and took them into the bathroom before Q heard the toilet being flushed. "I take it you have work to do?"

"Yes. I've secured the release of the body and possessions to us in the morning." Q moved back against the headboard, shuffling the baby again so he had an arm free to work on the laptop. "The woman who owns the flat is a Doris Newman; she's 82."

"Not our Woman, then?" Bond said, fixing himself a drink from the mini bar. "Are you monitoring the police reports?"

"Of course. They've listed her as a Jane Doe." The baby reached up and tried to pry Q's glasses off his face. He gently grasped his hand and moved it away and sighed. "I wish we knew his name."

"The other suspect?" Bond asked while taking a gulp from his whiskey.

"No, the baby. He's lost his mother tonight and he'll probably lose his father on terrorism charges. If we don't find out whom his parents are he'll lose his identity, too." As soon as Q reached back towards the laptop, the baby reached up for his glasses again.

"Like us, you mean?" Q didn't look at Bond. Though he knew the man knew about his childhood, he was quite unwilling to discuss it. He simply hummed in agreement, sighing again when the baby worked his glasses off his face this time, and started banging them on his bed. Bond laughed but put his drink down and sat down on the bed at Q's feet, working the glasses carefully from the chubby hands, which had a surprisingly strong grip on them.

"I'll change him and keep him occupied while you work." He placed the glasses back on Q's face and motioned for him to pass the babe over. Q did, and watched as Bond set him on his hip, and rummaged around in the bag for a onesie, a clean nappy, and wipes. He pulled his laptop closer and started tapping away to find CCTV from the area surrounding the flat to see if he could get a still of their woman and perhaps identify the male too. Out of the corner if his eye, he watched Bond change the baby with surprising ease. Afterwards, while Q continued to search through CCTV, Bond lay the baby down on the makeshift child-friendly bed, and played with a toy until the child's eyes finally closed.

"You have many talents, don't you, 007," Q commented, when the man quietly lay back down on his own bed.

"I had a brother," Bond told him, eyes fixed on the roof. Q hadn't known that. "It's not in my file. A bit of information that was conveniently lost long before I came to MI6. My father worked away a lot, so I used to help my mother with him. He was almost one when they were killed."  
Q thought then of his own siblings, both older, that were most definitely in his file. "Your parents?"

"Alpha and Omega." It was a common enough question for an Alpha, as the strongest, most powerful ones, were often born from an Alpha/Omega pairing. This in turn meant that Alpha and Omegas born to Beta parents usually mated to other Alpha and Omegas born from Beta parents. "As yours were."

"It's just strange that you and your brother had such an age gap." Finally, Q found a woman pushing a pram through the front entrance. Capturing a still of her face, he ran it through his face recognition program.

"As I said, my father was away a lot." Bond closed his eyes. "My mother spent her heats in a refuge." Q felt a pang of sympathy in his chest upon hearing that. Before heat suppressants were made widely available, unmated Omegas, or those in similar situations to Bond's mother, were forced to spend their heats in seclusion. The refuges had long been branded cruel and the majority of them had been disbanded. Q still heard the occasional horror story about them though.

"I have our woman, I think." His laptop beeped, indicating that a match had been found. He turned the screen to face Bond, who studied the passport photo that it had brought up intently.

"That's her," he confirmed, before getting under the covers.

"Jacinta Crass, Beta. Occupation, unemployed. Marital status, single. Children, one, a Benjamin Crass. Father listed as unknown." Q sighed and looked down at the sleeping child. "So, this is little Ben."  
Bond gave a bitter laugh. "My brother was called Ben."

"It's a lovely name." The agent didn't answer. "We should sleep now - we need to leave here in five hours."

"If it had escaped your notice, I _have__been trying to sleep for the last ten minutes, failing miserably, might I add, due to your incessant talking and your bloody laptop doing its best to light up the whole of Glasgow," the man snapped, causing Q to quickly shut off his laptop and hunker down in the bed. He lay facing away from Bond, trying to breathe as quietly as possible. After a few minutes, there was a rustling of sheets and soft footfalls before the bed dipped behind him. Two muscled arms pulled him against an equally muscular chest, and he felt a nose finding its way into his curls and inhaling deeply. "I'm sorry," was whispered into his unruly mop. "My nerves are shot after your heroics this evening."_

"Heroics? For goodness sake, Bond - I only woke you up." The man merely hummed, and Q listened as his breathing eventually evened out, before letting himself sleep, too.

It turned out that they didn't need the alarm that Q had set for 5am, as Ben woke them up a good hour earlier. Bond tried his best to calm him, as Q made a bottle of warm baby milk, using some sort of powder and warm water from the kettle. Even after he had gulped down the milk, he hadn't settled until Bond had needed the toilet and passed him over to Q. Ben had settled down immediately, burrowing his nose into Q's shoulder. Bond had raised an eyebrow and let out a small laugh before informing him that he should try and calm him first for the rest of the day.

The body and possessions were collected in an unmarked van, followed by an unmarked Audi with blacked-out windows, which pulled up outside their hotel at 5.45am. They arrived back in London at around 1pm, even with Q controlling the traffic lights on their way down. They had made one service station stop, where they had changed Ben and fed him orange baby food, which had made Q wrinkle his nose in disgust. When Q had strapped the child back in the car seat which had been provided, Bond pulled him back out of the car and sat him in the front passenger seat. This had given him a couple hours shuteye while Bond kept Ben distracted in the back seat. Once parked up in the MI6 parking lot, the agent whom they had travelled down with directed them straight into the lift, pressing the button for the seventh floor before backing out himself, letting the door close. Bond and Q shared a looked, both having similar feelings about M's debriefings. Ben gurgled and wiped a sticky hand on Q's favourite cardigan, just in time for the lift doors to open, revealing Moneypenny and M.

"My Office. I want to know everything you know." Tanner was already in M's office when they entered; he pulled a seat out for Q, who gave him a nod in thanks, seating Ben in his lap. "Q?"

"Still haven't identified the male suspect. You received all the information I managed to find on the woman this morning - I'm hoping I can find something from a storage device that's been listed with the possessions."

M nodded thoughtfully. "Do you think we could get a message around to let this guy know we have his son?"

"I could do," Q nodded.

"Good. Well, get on it, then. I want this guy caught." He dismissed them with a wave of his hand, but Q stayed seated.

"Sir? The child?"

M frowned at him. "What about him?"

"Who's going to look after him?"

frown deepened then. "Well, I thought you..."

He was interrupted by both Bond and Q's protests that they couldn't possibly look after a child and continue with the hours that they put in for MI6. Moneypenny laughed at their awkward excuses (_"MI6 has a crèche, you know"_). "Oh for goodness sake, you two; I'll take him."

And so it was agreed, and little Ben was handed over into the caring arms of Eve. It wasn't for another hour that Q decided that perhaps he missed the little guy a bit.


End file.
